Today I happened to listen to a good business case, the story of 2 barber shops(Lets call the owners of the respective stores as Mr. A and Mr. B ) which opened simulataneoulsy at the same time, in the same locality, Now this was the perfect setting to witness the market dynamics. The owner of one of the shops whom I visit frequently , Mr. A , happened to narrate his store’s evolution from a no-branded place to a decently popular store.

We come across in textbooks that CRM is the buzzword and we talk of so many strategies and 24*7 is almost taken as granted . But this person who was narrating his business story did not learnt about 24*7 in some B school, but he understood the concept somehow from day 1. When B used to keep his shop closed for 1 hr in the afternoon, instead of following the same routine as that of the B, A used to introduce a lot of incentives specifically in that 1 hr slot when there was no competition for him.After listening to some of the tactics and strategies , he used , I was completely spellbound by his presence of mind. He started off with having work shifts among the people he employed, opened a small place where employees could have their food, instead of going to other place and thereby missing the customers, who might want the same employee to work on their hair.There are a lot more interesting tactics which I will touch upon someother time.

If you ponder over the situation, It is actually a very complex OR problem. The variables involved are customer arrival timings, departure timings, their preference to some workers, the rival stores customer’s visits, employee work patttern, holidays, target market. etc…But A seems to have managed to solve this complex OR problem, not by using some hill climbing or snow falling algorithm, but by simply focusing on one customer at a time.He judged the preferences of the customers and tried out various combinations of workers on his clients, he did not invest on magazines , TV , Radio, which do not allow him to listen to his customers. Even though they might be important for a barber shop, for a service which has just started, the quality of service is more important that any other peripheral issues. This strategy allowed him to listen to the customers and slowly understand their tastes and preferences.For an internet startup too, Quality of service is much much more important than any other activity

The one hour of slot which B was using for lunch, gave him a tremendous opportunity for experimentation too !. A played with various hair style techniques and used them on some of the regular slot customers. This is
streetsmartness.No amount of reading kotler will give u this insight

At the end of A’s narration, one thing that was more than reinforced in my mind was that businesses which have survived and which will survive are the ones that will target one customer at a time and provide 24*7 service to each customer at a time, and more importantly LISTEN TO THEM , all the time.