Quick Car Insurance

Once upon a time, in a town not far away… there was a little general store. It was a nice little store, full of things that you need every day, like bread and butter and soap and potatoes. It also had things you don’t need very often such as glue and seed and axes but were appreciated by the customers.

The best part about the store was the very nice people behind the counter, Mr and Mrs Chumly. Whenever I went in, they would always say “Hello, how are you today Timmy?” It didn’t matter who came in, they always knew who they were and said hello to them by name.

Outside the store was a petrol pump and cans of oil. When Dad needed petrol, he would stop for a while and chat to Mr Chumly. Whenever I had to go there for Mum, she would give me a list of the things she needed for the week. I would hand Mr Chumly the list and he would walk around behind the counter picking each item off the shelves.

He knew us quite well, because sometimes he would say things like “The list just says ‘soap’, but not what kind. It’s lucky I know that ‘Skin-off’ is her favourite, so I’ll give her that one” or at another times he would say “Your mum’s having another baby next week, so I’ll add some extra tins of food so you can look after yourselves while she recovers.” He never had a very big range of things, but always seemed to have the ones we needed. Mum and Dad would run out of money sometimes, so Mr Chumly let them ‘book-it-up’ until they could pay for it. He even sent us a Christmas card each year.

One day, Mr Chumly changed the shop around. Dad said that it was because times were changing. He made the store bigger, added a lot more stuff and put shelves down the middle so you could pick the groceries yourself.

When I took the list in, I had to go around and get the stuff myself, which was so confusing since Mum didn’t always say exactly what she wanted. It’s hard to get it right now. We sometimes run out of things and I sometimes buy the wrong types.

We can’t book-it-up anymore either. We have to pay cash or just not buy it. My Chumly says that he has cut the price of a lot of the things, so this should make up for it. He also stopped stocking seed and axes and took the petrol pump out. Dad never goes there now and no longer chats to Mr Chumly. I really miss the old general store and Mr Chumly being so helpful to us.

So what REALLY changed? Mr Chumly set his sights on a much greater number of customers. To do this, he offered a wider range, made the store self-help and lowered prices. BUT – he severely sacrificed service. By adding a much wider range of products, his thinking was that people would respond to choice over personal advice on the best ones – WRONG! Most importantly – he failed to keep in touch with the customers who had trusted him and who had placed a high value on his knowledge and friendship.