"So easy a plumber can do it..." might not have the ring of Geico's caveman commercials, but when I saw this book excerpt on friend Phil Gerbyshak's blog from The Celebrity Experience, Insider Secrets to Delivering Red Carpet Customer Service, I knew I had to share it with you.

Author Donna Cutting tells a story about Hub Plumbing and Mechanical, a Boston-area plumbing company.  From the book:

Everyone in the company, including apprentices, has a business card. They give out slick folders, fun magnets, and dry erase boards. They've even been known to replace your toilet paper with a new roll bearing the Hub logo!

But John Wood knows something else, too. He knows that branding is not about the trucks, the carpets, or the toilet paper. It's about the service. If John and his team weren't consistent in the service they provide, the red trucks, the red uniforms, and the red carpets would simply be decoration. And if Hub Plumbing & Mechanical just relied on decor and didn't deliver the goods, it would not have grown from a one-man operation to a $1.5 million business with 11 employees in just six short years.

When you call Hub Plumbing, any time of the day or night, a live person answers the phone. (Once you have an appointment) you receive an email from your plumber. He tells you approximately when to expect him, what his specialties are, and all about his family and hobbies. As John says, "When people hire a plumber, their expectations are low. Our guys have personalities!

Did I mention the e-mail is in HTML format and a photo of your plumber is included?

The day of the visit, your plumber calls when he's on his way to the job. If he's running late, he will call in plenty of time to see if you want to wait or if you'd rather reschedule. Assuming the best, you would soon look out your window and see the bright red Hub Plumbing truck roll up to your house.

Once you have invited your plumber in, he puts plastic covers over his shoes to keep from marking up the carpet. And he lays down the red carpet with the Hub logo, and places his tools like surgical instruments on it. It's their Red Carpet Service.

Hub Plumbing took a look at things people said they'd disliked about plumbers:  showing up late, looking bad (plumber's crack, anyone?), overcharging and leaving a mess -- and changed everything.   

Lawyers, if you had to change everything about lawyers that clients hate, where would you start?

And if you want some motivation, take a look at Hub's Testimonial page.  Do your customers say the same things about you?

UPDATE:  Forgot to mention, HUB charges by the project, not the hour.

UPDATE 2:  Changed the title of the post and edited the content a bit.  Wasn't meaning to demean plumbers, just show how one plumbing company rethought their business to address (admittedly stereotypical) concerns people had about plumbers.  I wish lawyers (who can teach plumbers a thing or two about undeserved stereotypes) would do the same thing.