Four Roses Fail

The true test of a brand is how they respond to customers even after they leave your store.

A couple of weeks ago, my hubby and I headed to the bourbon trail in Louisville, Kentucky, for a business event and a bit of fun. While we were there, we visited a number of distilleries, the first of which was Four Roses.

My husband had gone to Four Roses previously and came back with bourbon, glassware, candles, and a super beautiful throw for our couch. I couldn’t wait to experience it, too.

When we were there, we had a drink at the bar (my first ever paper plane—how good!) and then went to their gift shop. I proceeded to load up on some new whiskey dram glasses, several candles, and, of course, some of their bourbon.

This was the only distillery that packaged our goods in boxes. We had two boxes of glassware and candles nicely wrapped and placed in the back of our vehicle.

A week later, when I got home, I was disappointed to find two of my glasses had a tiny chip on the rim.

By this point, I had unpacked everything, thrown away my receipts, washed glasses, etc., and felt like this was likely a lost cause, but…

I reached out to them on Instagram to explain what happened and to ask if they could do anything.

Radio silence.

Then I thought, maybe my message was in their other folder, and they didn’t see it. I mean, it’s possible, right? So I went to their website, filled out a form via their contact page, and explained what had happened.

Radio silence again.

It’s been several weeks, and I have not heard back from either of these customer-facing communication channels.

The glasses are really no big deal. Sure, it is a disappointment, but oh well. What is a bigger deal to me is that a brand like this, along with many other businesses, set up communication channels via its website and social media and then fails to respond to actual paying customers.

Your brand is defined by how people feel about you, and it doesn’t feel good to be ignored. Four Roses should and could do better, and so can you.

Make it a point to check all of your communication channels on a regular basis and respond to folks. I would have completely understood a “sorry, we can’t do anything unless you come back to the store,” but because they ghosted me, I will never go back to their store. Period.

Don’t make the same mistake they did with your own business. Responsiveness can be your competitive advantage.