The Power of the People

Over the last few months I have made some fairly strong negative comments about Southcorp in some articles and in general postings on Auswine Forum. Specifically my gripes were two.

Firstly, their apparent contempt and dismissal of any negative comments made on the Internet and refusal to take this medium seriously. We were basically deemed as “troublemakers who were full of hot air.” Secondly, in a number of dealings with Southcorp I had found them to be somewhat arrogant, patronising and lacking genuine customers focus and care.

The facts were reported as they occurred. Some via internet wine forums and one major peace (on dud wine and corks problems) that was published on the front page of Robin Garr’s Winelovers (a US wine site) which was read by about 300,00 people. Southcorp did not come up looking like “a bed of roses” in that article and some of their competition appeared to be much more cooperative and open about the issues.

Recently I cause to contact Southcorps Customer Relations Department about a concern I had with one of their products and expected to get the usual run around response that I had received in the past. However something had “changed.”

The first sign was a response from the manager of the department rather than the person I contacted. The opening line was “Thank you for your email concerning the 1994 Rosemount Show Reserve Shiraz. Customer feedback is extremely important to us and it is something we take seriously.” And take it seriously they did. My comments and concerns were sent to the winemakers who opened a bottle from their Museum Stock to check and compare. I then received a very detailed response including an honest “no holds barred” Tasting Note on the wine and some additional technical information about the problem. They also offered to take back my existing stock of the 94 vintage and replace it with wine from the current vintage.

They went out of their way to be supportive and did absolutely everything possible to try and assist with this problem, and they are to be congratulated for this response.

There is one further thing that I would like to share with you and I hope you find it interesting, it certainly peaked my interest. At the bottom of the email me from Southcorp, it showed they had done an Internet search looking to see what I had written on this site, WCWN and WLDG. (which are the two largest US wine sites.) And they must have looked at the articles judging by one of the email attachments. I don’t know if the proof of these searches was left there accidentally or on purpose. I will never know the answer to that, but it’s not important anyway.

However what is important is that it appears that Southcorp is starting to take Internet comment and feedback seriously. It also looks like when the “little people” i.e. all the forum wine posters openly discuss an issue and make comment the message in now getting through. Finally, it looks like Southcorps is listening, they are starting to hear and realise, that we their Internet customers, want better service. That’s a good first step Southcorp, lets hope they keep it up. Their actions in the future will tell us how serious they are about listening and looking after their customers.

Cheers