A quest for an ingenious business

If you buy a Lighter then you would expect it to have gas in it – right? Well when I purchased one from the Oasis Superette  in Papamoa it didn’t. I went back and they put it right for me without blinking. They were really helpful and its an enjoyable experience going to their store.

The service I experience at the Oasis was great, if not very good, better than I had experienced at a dairy or superette in years. And yet it was not remarkable or ingenious (save for the fact that I now tell you about it)

I would go back to that store as opposed to the store 50 metres down the road (and recommend that you do), but I wont drive for 20 minutes to go back the next time I'm in Tauranga

A recently read book by Seth Godin called “Purple Cow” ^ which says the “remarkable is the opposite of very good”, and this has caused me to think about our ^ desire to provide ingenious services.

The America Heritage Dictionary ^ defines ingenious as “1. Marked by inventive skill and imagination. 2. Having or arising from an inventive or cunning mind; clever: an ingenious scheme.”

In business I believe that Ingenious means providing remarkable and inventive and edgy and stunning service.

Ingenious companies care about their customers and are truly creative about meeting their needs. The type of service they provide gets noticed and talked about and ingenious businesses are known to be the experts, the geniuses, the elite, the ONLY place to get that service.

I am starting a short-term quest to post comments on businesses that are ingenious and those that aren’t and why.