You may not believe this. 

Quite frankly, I am not sure I believe it myself.

I got a call from L.L. Bean.

A very nice man from their research department caught my husband at home.  Since he seemed rather eager to speak to me, Kris passed him on my work and mobile phone numbers.  Since I was in a training meeting all morning, he left a polite message on my cell phone asking me to call Bean’s research department and talk to him.

When I retrieved that message from my cell, my bemusement at the entire episode dissolved into amazement.  I found it delightfully shocking that a company would be putting this much effort into one small, albeit personally irritating, episode.  I mean this is a major cataloguer that must handle hundreds, if not thousands, of orders a day.

 When I finally was able to catch up with him, he carefully explained that they had looked into the issues that I had earlier regarding my order and was able to track the source of the problem and the misunderstanding.  They appreciated my patience, and my patronage as a customer.  I explained that the major reason for my irritation was that that I could not understand what was making such a simple transaction so darned difficult when I normally have such high expectations of their customer service.

Well, that’s it exactly, isn’t it?

The fact that they put so much effort into this explains just WHY I have been able to have those expectations.  

He explained that they do care about their reputation as a good company to do business with.  And, after this?  I believe it.

He said that they have located my sweater.  In my size.  In the color that I ORIGINALLY wanted.  And that they were sending it to me free of charge.   That really, really made my day.

Sweater notwithstanding, the fact that they took the time to track this whole thing down made my YEAR.

So, wow, it did get me my sweater.

And just a tiny bit more faith in corporate America.