29 Sep 09

Are You Being Served? Part 1

A quick word to the readers who aren’t Singaporean: Singapore’s service industry has a longstanding poor reputation. It’s something locals always compare and complain about. So a group of people are trying to do something to hopefully make some difference.

Are You Being Served? is an initiative started by Singapore Tourism Board and I’m so pleased to be a small part of it. For me, I get to experience service (good or bad) mostly when I dine out. I hardly shop in stores and generally am a ‘i-will-look-for-it-myself’ kind of a shopper. At restaurants, I’m usually partial to servers because I know most of them are doing it part-time so it’s easy to simply treat it as a job and not a job you love. I worked in the F&B line while in school too so I can speak for myself at least. I am digressing… So! When asked to think up a mission to put our service industry to the test, I didn’t want to do food as I might be able to predict the outcome so the next best thing was to try something real, something which I meant to do myself with or without this mission.

Industry: Retail {Electronics}
Mission details: I want to get educated on the different types of sewing machines out there in the market. As a beginner, I’m definitely looking for something pretty entry-level but not too basic. But more importantly I want to find out the difference between a serger and an overlock sewing machine, what are the factors I should be considering – maybe someone who sews clothing and someone who makes curtains require different types of machines? In my head I’m thinking of how I’ve come to learn to choose between a DSLR and a point-and-shoot camera, I’ve learnt what to look out for and what I have to compromise on. So with this mission, I’m really hoping to get in tuned with sewing machines!
Service skill to test: Knowledge of product and possibly personal experience
Estimated expense (SGD): $0 because I’m window shopping!

I will be carrying out my mission next week and to be fair, I won’t be testing some sales guy who unfortunately was lurking around the sewing machines department in Harvey Norman or Courts. So check back next week to find out how it all goes down!

P.S. If you know about sewing machines, you’re most welcome to share your knowledge and experiences!

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