What’s The Real Bottom Line?

I stopped by the drive through window at Burger King on my way home one day last week to use a coupon for a free four-piece box of chicken tenders (I needed a snack to hold me over until dinner… I eat a lot… gimme a break). When I arrived at the pickup window, I asked for an extra sauce, and I was told it would be 25 cents additional.

An extra 25 cents? For one lousy extra sauce? Really?

I know the economy is in the toilet and the bottom line for all companies has become ever more important and they’re all pinching pennies — even big companies like Burger King. After all, we’re in what’s most likely the worst economy this country has seen since the Great Depression (which started back in October 1929).

But, is it really necessary to be THAT frugal? With the bulk amounts that Burger King purchases EVERTHING in, relative to the amount of business they do, they surely get everything at an incredibly cheap per unit price, including those sauce packs they dispense. And while I, of course, have no precise numbers to go on, if each of those sauces cost the company more than two cents I’d be shocked.

I was listening to CBS News Radio during a drive home a couple of months ago, when they broadcasted a report on a new economic study. They said that the average American currently eats out approximately three times a week. With the poor economy, though, fast food chains are getting a lot of that business. So, with the traffic for those restaurants remaining relatively steady even in this poor economic climate, obviously, business isn’t that bad.

So where do companies draw the line between pinching pennies (literally, pennies, at times) and customer satisfaction and loyalty? In this economy, many companies are offering discounts on their products — whether it be clothing, electronics, or food — to generate increased revenue, while others take the opposite route and tighten their belts, down to the smallest details.

I think that some companies have become so lost in tracking their bottom line that they’ve forgotten about customer satisfaction and customer service. And forgotten that if they set policies that alienate their clientele, their bottom line is going to get worse and their revenue stream will fall into the red, achieving the exact opposite of what they hoped for with their penny-pinching strategies.

I mean, I’ll still end up going back to Burger King. Of course I will. But there surely are those who, when they encounter this affront, will be so turned off they’ll never return to Burger King, and they’ll take their business elsewhere. After all, there’s no shortage of other fast food chains. Some folks might even rediscover making food at home or picking it up already prepared at a supermarket, grabbing it to go, bypassing that fast food chain altogether.

The bottom line is that there is, in fact, a line — a line between watching your company’s finances, and how you treat your customers — and an extra sauce pack might just be teetering on that line.

“In business you get what you want by giving other people what they want.” – Alice Foote MacDougall

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