Zappos Sent Me a Unicorn!

The story of the best customer service on the planet.

I mostly write about moments where technology transforms our lives and pushes our expectations higher and higher. This is not one of those moments. This is a story of human connection, thoughtfulness and a freaking unicorn! This a story about how Zappos lives up to this logo:

It started off simple enough. My wife ordered several pairs of shoes from Zappos for the kids for back to school — with 48 hour shipping. On the day they were supposed to arrive, they didn’t. My wife checked her app and noticed they hadn’t even left the warehouse. So she called customer service to see if there was an issue with our credit card, or if she had entered our address incorrectly. She didn’t call to complain, just to check on the order. The customer service rep was incredibly kind and noticed it was a back to school order. She also chatted up my son who was in the car with my wife when she called. She apologized profusely for the kids not getting their shoes in time for the first day of school and credited us $50 on a $200 order. The shoes arrived the next day. I was amazed by the service. But wait…there’s more!

A week later (yesterday) the box in the attached picture appeared on our doorstep. You can see the size of the box as my son’s bike is next to it. The box was huge and had "Surprise Zappos" stickers all over the box. Upon opening the box, there was a personal note (pictured) from our customer service rep and 2 gifts for the kids—along with a plethora of glitter and tinsel. In the box was a new backpack and lunch box for my son and a GIANT LIFE SIZE STUFFED UNICORN for my daughter (pictured). The kids went bezerk as you could imagine. To my daughter it was Christmas morning. Of course now I have to figure out where to put this giant unicorn in our house….

We have posted about the experience on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and told every friend and family about the experience in the last 24 hours. I have had several people tell me after hearing the story that they were going to start using Zappos. I had heard about Zappos' great customer service, but this was astonishing. My wife wasn’t an angry customer and would have been happy with an update let alone a credit. But the gifts made her a fan for life and were truly surprise and delight.

This moment was truly the last/best customer service experience I've had in my life. It just goes to show that in an era of cold digital, sometimes it takes an old-fashioned analog experience to break through....

Until the next Last/Best...........

In the meantime, you can always find more Last/Best ramblings here.