Here’s a story that I hope makes you look at what you deliver with your personal value. Doesn’t matter if you make products, deliver services, are a teacher or coach, it’s attention to detail that brings forth delight in your customers…or gives them the opposite.
My son turned 13 years old this week and he was out of school so I hunted for some place within driving distance where it was NOT raining. Turns out Las Vegas for Kids (i.e., the Wisconsin Dells) was supposed to have great weather (it does…it was 86 today!) there’d clearly be stuff to do and it would be cheap this time of year. For the same reasons I don’t particularly care for the real Las Vegas (smoky, noisy, gambling is a tax on the stupid, it mostly caters to prurient and base interests, etc.) I thought it could be interesting and I’d just look past the cheesy glitter and all that was tacky and make sure my guy had fun.
We’ve had a great time goofin’ around today but something occurred that I just can’t shake. We went to an attraction that is still making me scratch my head in wonder at how someone could invest significant sums to build and staff an attraction and then not focus on the details and an experience that turned out be incredibly lame. The attraction is called Top Secret.
The premise to Top Secret is that it’s an upside down White House and aliens have taken over (did they flip it over? We never did learn the backstory which was a huge mistake on their part) and these aliens are building robotic presidents. Though that is as good an explanation as any for how the last seven years of the Bush administration actually came to be, it’s unfortunate in an amusement that is $12 a head and when the attraction doesn’t do much with the premise.
My first clue that this wasn’t going to be a great adventure should’ve been the tragic misspelling that was plastered all over everything. When we walked up to the ticket booth, the expensive and nice polo shirts the staff were wearing were emblazoned with the words, “Top Secret: Archeological Experience“. I mentioned to the young woman taking tickets that “archeological” was misspelled and should be spelled “archaeological” (she was a young college graduate I might add) and she seemed disbelieving until I grabbed my iPhone, did a quick lookup on Dictionary.com and showed her. She was mortified and indicated she would mention it to her boss.
Steve’s Social Stuff