Catfish

Towards the end of the 2010 documentary Catfish, Nev Schulman finally meets the woman with whom he’s carried on a long-term online relationship. She is, he discovers, not young and single, but in her 40s and married. By way of metaphorical explanation, the woman’s husband, Vince Pierce, recounts the following story, which inspired the name of the film:

They used to tank cod from Alaska all the way to China. They’d keep them in vats in the ship. By the time the codfish reached China, the flesh was mush and tasteless. So this guy came up with the idea that if you put these cods in these big vats, put some catfish in with them and the catfish will keep the cod agile. And there are those people who are catfish in life. And they keep you on your toes. They keep you guessing, they keep you thinking, they keep you fresh. And I thank god for the catfish because we would be droll, boring and dull if we didn't have somebody nipping at our fin.

Intro courtesy of slate.com.

It's my turn.  Despite saying I wasn't going to write to Mamas and Papas' customer services again, I changed my mind and dropped them a note.

Dear Vxxxx,

It's been nearly two weeks since we last spoke and I'm keen to understand how this issue is progressing internally.  You mentioned that you were planning to review your spares pricing and system.  Can you advise on whether any decisions have been made, what they were and when any changes might be implemented?

Regards,
Sxxxxx

Not expecting much from the response, but at least it keeps the issue on their radar and better sets up my next communication to the management team.

Google stats

Afraid I had to take a break from this over the last few days, but like rust, the web never sleeps. Or something.

I Googled the phrase "mamas and papas spares" this evening just to see what other stories might be out there and found my site in the first page of hits.  Number 9 to be precise.  Not bad for a key phrase and only after a couple of weeks.  I reckon that means I'm halfway to getting a high page ranking on the "Mamas and Papas" key phrase too.  So what I would ask is that if you're interested in what I'm doing and support it, you link your own sites to both this blog and www.mamasandpapasspares.com.

Ta.

Think Global, Act Local

When I first posted a note on Mamas and Papas' Facebook page I didn't expect anyone to spot it and thought it would a quiet dialogue between me and the company.  However, that's proven not to be the case and the story appears to have resonated with a large number of people. Since that first posting I've been amazed at the number of people who have offered support and advice as well as those that have empathised out of a sense of consumer justice, and even a number of people that made me aware that they had experienced a similar story themselves.

Then when I started blogging about it I had no idea how far that would reach.  Today's stats show that while the majority of people are reading from the UK, I appear to have collected a few readers in some far flung parts of the world.

It's that support that makes me sure that I'm doing the right thing and need to push on with the campaign.

From yesterday email I think it's clear now that there is little point responding to the customer services team.  They're just doing their job and holding the company line.  It's the decision makers I need to find.  And find them I think I have.

David and Luisa Scacchetti - Husband and wife team - owners
Tim Maule - Deputy CEO
Amanda Scacchetti - Product Development Director
Rob Jennings - E Commerce Director
Jason Greenwood - Group Finance Director
Karl Brown - Group HR Director
Olivia Robinson - Creative Director
Louise Bontoft - Design Manager in New Product Development
Jason Barker - Head of Integrity (Seriously!)
Marek Laskowski - Retail Managing Director

I've also found their legal team, but I think I'll steer clear of them for now.

The next step will be to communicate with them directly ensuring the message is consistent and persistent.  It's important I get this one right in terms of content and tone, so I'm going to spend a bit of time crafting it.

In the meantime, I've also found another thing that irked me.  Hidden in a corner and only apparently accessible through a Google search was a page that describes a comprehensive spare parts service.

http://www.mamasandpapas.com/order_spares.php

Back to the original argument, the question I would ask is whether this statement really described the service that is offered to people making enquiries about spares for discontinued items.

Anyway, time to get writing I think.

The response from Mamas and Papas

I spoke with Mamas & Papas' customer services team today.  Perhaps I was a little naive to think that they would see things my way at the first attempt, but unfortunately they didn't.  Essentially it came down to two things:

1.  They did not believe that it was reasonable to hold spares beyond two years despite my assertion that by design these units have a longer lifespan and 
2. They wouldn't be able to implement standard components in their global supply chain. 

They did say that they were discussing the feedback although given that conversation I don't think it will be particularly high on their to-do list. Still have a few tricks up my sleeve, though, so onwards and upwards!

They followed up with an email to confirm the position.  Interestingly, this came from a different person than the one with which I had the conversation.

Dear xxxx 

Further to your telephone conversation today with Fxxx, I am sorry that you remain unhappy with our response to your enquiry. I understand that you purchased your Murano cot bed from us a few years ago. This has been used as a cot and later converted to a junior bed and was used fault free since purchase. I am aware that more recently, you have opted to gift the cot bed to a friend and discovered 4 screws to be missing that were originally used in the assembly of the cot. We are genuinely sorry that this is the case and being that the Murano range is now discontinued, we are unable to supply you with replacement fittings. We do not recommend that you use replacement parts that are not recommended or supplied by us as non-approved parts may render the cot bed as unsafe. We realise that this may be frustrating and disappointing in circumstances such as yours, where parts have been misplaced. 

I am sure you can appreciate that the safety of all our products is of the utmost concern to us. All our products are stringently tested for safety, durability and for compliance to the current safety regulations. With safety being our priority, we also want to provide our customers with the most innovative designs and offer and extended choice of many different styles and colours, that we believe would compliment our customers nurseries. To enable us to provide this variety, the supply chain we have is worldwide and therefore prevents us from being able to provide universal fittings for our cot beds and furniture ranges.

When originally purchasing your cot bed, we offered a 12 months manufacturing guarantee. It is reasonable to expect that in the unlikely event a fault in manufacture was to occur, this prevail within this time frame. However, as a further commitment, we will hold spare parts for up to 2 years after a product becomes discontinued.
All components and fittings are listed in the instruction manual and specific reference is made to ensure all parts are identified prior to assembly and if there is any discrepancy, we ask that we are contacted to ensure we can remedy this. Thereafter, responsibility to secure all components and fittings must lie with the consumer. 

As a direct result of your feedback and further research carried out by us, the pricing of our spare parts is currently under review and we hope to improve this within the foreseeable future. 

I can confirm that we are seriously considering your suggestion to offer a more streamlined spares system. We genuinely take on board all our customers feedback and will implement changes where necessary. It is with regret that we cannot offer specific feedback as to what our future collections may include, but can give you our assurance that as a business, we have taken on board all the comments you have made and will continue to investigate these internally. 

Once again, we are genuinely sorry that we have been unable to provide the spare parts you required on this occasion and again thank you for your detailed feedback, this will most definitely help us to continue to review this situation and meet with our customers expectations. 

Best Regards
Vxxx
Customer Care Manager

I am now considering my response.  I only wonder if there is something I can take from their comment about the pricing of spare parts.  I like to see the best in people where I can, and maybe they are listening.  Needless to say I'm not going to go away any time soon.

Screw pics

I've been asked to post pictures of the screws that have been the root of all this, so here you are.  You'll see that they're pretty small, somewhat inconsequential items.

The one on the left is the original grub screw and the one on the right is the replacement.  You can see why to the untrained eye it might be difficult to believe that the new one would be suitable, but when you look below, you can see the size of the recess that it fills. 

Like I've said before, almost as if it was designed that way.

Grub screws

I delivered the cot today and put it up in the new baby's nursery.  It all looks good and the substitute screws fit just fine, so all good there.

My friends recognised the original screw type though.  They're both technical people and they told me it was a grub screw, something I'd never heard of.  I've now found various vendors on the web for a similar type of screw to the headless original.  But this begs the question - why did M&P's customer service agent suggest that these would be difficult to find?  It looks like they're standard fittings after all.  With a little more information on the parts database they could have advised me better and my frustration could have been disappointed.  Maybe that's something I will discuss with Fiona on Monday.


Further update...

Been thinking about this.  I have to question why I was advised by M&P's CSA that these were bespoke parts that would be hard to replace elsewhere? It's either one of two things I reckon. It could be a lack of training and the CSA is as clueless as I am about the types and names of screws and fittings and their systems are not set out to help them because it's not occurred to M&Ps that this might be a good thing to do. Alternatively, it could be that M&Ps have made a conscious decision to ask their CSAs to push their parts packs because they make a bit of money out of it. Either way I think they need to do something about it.

Contact attempted

Well, good to see an effort being made by M&Ps today.  I picked up a couple of voice mails from Fiona who works in the "High Level Customer Relations" team.  Unfortunately I was unable to take the calls due to work commitments so have set up a time to talk.  Campaign is now on pause pending a discussion scheduled for Monday morning.  Looking forward to what I hope will be a constructive dialogue.