Let's hear it for baseball caps!
Time was, only baseball players and baseball fans wore baseball caps. Today, just about everyone engaged in just about every kind of work and leisure activity sports one.
Why the baseball cap's recent enormous popularity? I'd tell you, if I knew.
What I do know from experience is that a fumiture delivery crew that shows up at a customer's doorstep wearing caps-baseball or otherwise-and matching shirts, trousers and jackets looks far more professional and makes a far better impression than a coupe of guys in tee shirts and jeans. At least that's what professionals we've queried-something we do regularly-have told us over the years.
Given that fact, it's surprising how many furniture stores still make deliveries with crews in "civvies"-according to a recent store owner and manager survey, a whopping 58 percent against 27 percent in uniform. (The remaining 15 percent surveyed didn't answer this question.)
Even more surprising is the fact that most of the stores-stores with $1 million to $10 million annual volume -rate delivery crew carefulness, courtesy and punctuality major considerations when hiring a delivery service. How a crew looks strikes me as being in the same ballpark as how a crew acts.
When the men come through the door with a piece of furniture your customer has eagerly awaited, she couldn't care less whether your name or the delivery service's name is on their caps. To her, at that crucial last moment of sale, the men delivering the goods are you.
Just as how your delivery trucks look and how carefully they're driven impacts on you, so does the way your delivery crew looks and acts.
If the men are careful, courteous and punctual, they'll help close your sale on the best possible note. If they're also neatly uniformed, so much the better.
Let's hear it for sartorial splendor -and for baseball caps. Your delivery team's caps are as much a part of your image as are any baseball team's caps a part of theirs.