The Waitress Remembered My Order. Your Business Should Be Paying Attention.

Business Is Personal

There are restaurants you visit because you are hungry.

Then there are places that become part of your life.

For me, that place is the Golden Nugget on Central Avenue in Chicago.

I have been going there for the majority of my life. It started as a tradition with my grandfather, and birthdays became connected to Golden Nugget for me.

If something good happened, I wanted to celebrate there.

If I was having a bad day and needed somewhere familiar, I wanted to go there.

If I wanted to spend time with people I loved and make the moment feel like a memory instead of just another outing, Golden Nugget was usually somewhere in the plan.

My close friends know this about me.

Golden Nugget is comfort.

It is celebration.

It is family.

It is memory.

And somewhere along the way, one of the women who worked there became part of that tradition too.

She Remembered Me

There is a waitress there who has remembered my order for years.

She sees me come in, greets me, and already knows.

That alone would have been enough to teach me something about customer experience.

But the story became even more personal.

For approximately 15 years, I had been coming into that restaurant to celebrate my birthday before I learned something I never expected:

We have the same birthday.

All those years I was walking into Golden Nugget celebrating my birthday, and she was having a birthday too.

Once we realized it, the tradition became even more special.

She told me that because she knows I come there for my birthday, she likes starting her own birthday by working and seeing me.

She is a few years older than I am, and ever since I learned that we share the same birthday, I have looked forward to the tradition even more.

Think about that.

A restaurant employee and a customer who probably never would have met anywhere else became part of each other's birthday tradition.

That is bigger than customer service.

That is relationship.

That is memory.

And that is what businesses sometimes fail to understand about the experiences they create.

You May Be Selling More Than You Think

Golden Nugget may sell breakfast, lunch, dinner, coffee, pancakes, and whatever else somebody orders that day.

But that is not everything they have sold me.

They have given me a place where I celebrated birthdays with my grandfather.

A place connected to people I love.

A place I have gone when I needed comfort.

A place associated with milestones.

A place where, after 15 years, I discovered that someone serving me had quietly been celebrating her birthday too.

That is why loyalty is not always transactional.

Sometimes people return because your business has become part of the story of their lives.

That kind of loyalty cannot be manufactured with a rewards card.

It is built one experience at a time.

Remembering People Is a Business Strategy

Businesses spend tremendous amounts of money trying to personalize customer experiences.

We have CRMs.

Client portals.

Databases.

Automated emails.

Customer profiles.

Loyalty programs.

All of those tools can be useful.

But none of them matter if we collect information without actually paying attention to people.

The goal of technology should not simply be to remember somebody's email address.

It should help us remember the relationship.

A client should not have to explain their entire history every time they contact you.

A parent should not have to repeat important information about their child to every person in an organization.

A returning customer should not feel like a stranger.

Good systems should help people feel known.

Because being remembered communicates something:

You mattered enough for me to pay attention.

Education and Mentorship Work the Same Way

This lesson extends far beyond business.

Young people notice when adults remember what they say.

If a student tells you they want to attend a certain college, ask about it again.

If they tell you about a business idea, remember the idea.

If they are nervous about an interview, check on them afterward.

If they tell you something important about their family, their dreams, or their fears, do not make them start from the beginning every time you see them.

Sometimes the most powerful mentoring statement is not:

“I believe in you.”

Sometimes it is:

“I remembered what you told me.”

That communicates belief too.

Education should make young people feel seen.

Mentorship should make them feel known.

And businesses should make people feel remembered.

Your Journal Work

Think about the people who repeatedly interact with your business, school, organization, classroom, or program.

Ask yourself:

Who has been loyal to me that I may have taken for granted?

What do I know about the people I serve beyond what they purchased?

What information are people repeatedly giving me because my systems are not remembering it?

When someone returns, does my organization make them feel like a stranger or like someone who belongs?

And perhaps the most important question:

What memories are people creating while they are with us that we may not even know we are part of?

That last question matters to me.

Because somewhere along the way, Golden Nugget became part of my family's story.

Part of my grandfather's story.

Part of my birthday story.

Part of my friendship story.

Part of my celebration story.

And even part of the days when nothing particularly good was happening and I simply needed somewhere familiar to go.

That kind of loyalty cannot be purchased with a marketing campaign.

It is earned over time.

One visit.

One meal.

One conversation.

One remembered order.

One memory at a time.

Maybe that is the real business lesson.

Do not simply ask how to get customers to return.

Ask yourself:

What kind of experience would make somebody want to make your business part of their life?

Because sometimes the strongest brand is not the business people recognize.

It is the place people cannot imagine their memories without.

For me, that place has been Golden Nugget.

And maybe one day, if The Most High sees fit, I will own the one on Central Avenue.

Until then, I will keep going back.

Because they remembered me.

And I remember what that place has meant to me.

Let's Make Business Personal.

"What does your business remember about the people it serves?"