I’ve often wondered why my wireless provider needs to put handcuffs on me in order to provide the services I need. It’s taken me a while, and a lot of insufferable service and interactions, but I’ve finally figured out the reason. If you provide†services that are so bad that customers would defect at their earliest opportunity, you need to tether customers so they won’t run away. Most of us accept this as an uninspiring daily reality. But here’s a radical thought – if these companies, and other organizations with similarly appalling levels of service, changed direction by creating experiences that were utterly inspiring,†meeting the needs of customers so seamlessly and accurately that they generated their unswerving loyalty – they would no longer need to rely on a contract to handcuff their customers. Just a thought!

But as I sat in an airport lounge before boarding a flight to Europe my thoughts turned to other sectors of the economy where terrible customer relationships and shabby services are common – airlines. Handcuffed with frequent-fliers plans, one routinely discovers that this is a come-on – “Lock in with us and we’ll fly you free to your dream destination”. Except that when you try to redeem your points, a thicket of hurdles will be thrown in front of you making it impossible to actually redeem your points, or the conditions will be so difficult it will not be worth your while. And don’t get me going about cable companies who entice you with low rates for the first year in an attempt to lock you in, and then jack up their fees in the second. Or magazines where the first year customer gets a better price than a long-standing one. Or cars that are so unappealing manufacturers need to offer you cash incentives to buy one.

So if loyalty programs are no more than†expensive insurance policies against shoddy service, the obvious answer is to ditch the flim-flam of loyalty gimmicks and replace them with good old-fashioned service that keeps bringing customers back – Hello Starbucks, Disney, Southwest Airlines, Patagonia, Bed Bath and Beyond, American Express, Whole Foods, Costco, Publix Supermarkets, and many others who understand this. Thanks for showing us how great service generates loyalty without the handcuffs. If you have a loyalty program, why do you need it? Is it merely an offset for the poor quality of your product or service?