When did it become acceptable for customer-centricity to be extraordinary instead of ordinary?

I went to dine at a small Japanese restaurant with a dear friend. We arrived 20-minutes before they closed for their afternoon break. It was a small place with limited seating.

As all seats were fully occupied on our arrival, we were told we would have to wait about 10-15 minutes to be seated. However, we weren’t told that they were closing at a set time so we’d have to swallow our food in 5-10 minutes to meet the imminent pre-set closing time.

As we waited, my friend said “You know they’re only doing this for us because they’re Japanese?” The implication being that many Japanese restaurants have a culture of being very customer-centric. This might seem to be a generalization and I do agree every country and culture has its own amount of assholes and I’m sure Japan wasn’t exempt in getting its fair share of assholes.

Regardless, I’ve also come to believe that stereotypes exist because they are in part true and the Japanese dedication to customer service is one I believe to be true more often than not. I’ve experienced everything from a janitor at a mall drop his cleaning supplies to guide me to a restaurant 20 minutes away before bowing and returning the way he came to continue cleaning….to a shoe store employee printing out a map of a restaurant I couldn’t find while a colleague covered for him with an actual shoe store client….to a coffee shop employee straightening out the creases in a paper bag until they were perfect before handing me my bag of muffins. Just my own experience.

This led to a further discussion about how most restaurants would’ve told us they were closing soon and we were out of luck. Most times, the blame would be on us as patrons for coming so close to closing time. This reminded me of how a large narrative for Amazon had been its obsession over customers. This was supposed to be unique. I mean, it must’ve been because every media outlet touted that as a secret sauce to Amazon’s success (among other things). I’ve even read in some annual reports of software companies (much younger than Amazon) that proudly talk about how customer-centric they are. To which I cannot help but scoff and think….how is this a selling point? Who actually thinks it's an idea worth sharing because it's so profound? Am I too demanding as a customer to have a company be focused on serving me because it’s taking my money?

How odd.

It makes me wonder how much corporations had to neglect customers for it to be something shocking to receive proper service. That it even became a topic of conversation because a restaurant would take us so close to closing time because we were so used to being turned away. Has this always been the case or has customer service declined as a standard?

One need only look at the state of airlines in North America to get grips of how low standards of customer service are. Some say it’s the result of constant price competition among a commoditized service but I think it’s an attitude. You either believe customers matter or you don’t. Furthermore, I’m inclined to think that the more a company touts they are customer focused, the less they probably are. If they are, why do they have to scream it? Wouldn’t their customers be screaming it for them by giving them more money?