KEY POINTS:
This is a story about a facial and how bossiness takes the fun out of everything. Oh, and the perils of letting someone else use your brand. Actually, it was the sign that started it. I have a thing about bumptious signs. This one, on the wall at the Servilles spa on Princes Wharf in Auckland, sniffily announced that if you did not give 24 hours' notice of cancellation of your appointment you would be charged 50 per cent of the cost of the treatment.
The strange thing was, it was on the back of the changing room door, so presumably if you were there, you had not cancelled, so the only purpose of the sign was to make you think what snotty people ran the place, which is hardly conducive to the plinkety-plonk calm-blue-ocean mental state one is aiming for ("The spa is a place of relaxation and tranquillity").
But then, everything since I had arrived at Servilles for a facial had been bossy and made me cross. Admittedly, at seven months' pregnant that is not hard. And I am certainly no expert on beauty treatments, having never had a manicure or a pedicure and being too ticklish to tolerate a massage. But this was just like going to hospital: no offer of a cup of tea (not even hippie grass-clippings?), a waiting room couch which collapsed, a bossy beauty therapist like Nurse Ratched from One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, no chummy small talk but more bossy rules ("Please be aware if you arrive late your treatment will still end on time", "Relax, yet respect that the room must be prepared for the next client").
Nurse Ratched told me to get into a bathrobe and marched me down long corridors and ordered me on to a very high, very hard examination couch. Did I mention I was seven months' pregnant? Since I was soon to be undergoing the same experience with stirrups, I wondered what I was doing here out of choice. Also, could I have an epidural for a facial?
After having to heave myself on and off the mortuary-like slab several times to get myself into a position acceptable to Nurse Ratched, I thought: "Sod this", followed by, "If I left I could have a cup of Earl Grey", followed by, "I'm lost. Where the hell is the changing room?" (In the way casinos have no clocks, spa designers seem to deliberately disorientate you by having no markings on any of the doors.) Finally I found my clothes and waddled out without so much as a slip slop of Pond's cold cream.
I sent an email to the manager of the Servilles spa - and cc'd it to the owner of the Servilles chain, Paul Huege de Serville. I get my hair cut by a great chick at Servilles called Frances and was surprised at the contrast between the two experiences. Not so surprisingly, it turns out Servilles spa is no longer part of Servilles. It has just been sold to a completely separate company called Spa Concepts which has the right to use the name for a year.
Moral of the story: If you are a business and you let someone use your name, you must be careful that they share your business philosophy vis a vis bossiness and client experience. Mr Serville was charming and apologetic and shouted me a free hairdo, and asked me to point out that this is the spa formerly known as Servilles.
But not everyone would know that. Someone should put up a sign.
