As a young engineer, I entered the market around 2009, working as an apprentice for other more experienced professionals. Among other things, I noticed that many of them had a certain style, they were wearing shirts and sweaters. Before that I had no style, I had just finished with my army service, and I wore whatever I wore as a student. But now I had to fit in. Therefore, I went and purchased some shirts and some sweaters. Quickly I became regular client of a certain local company, that was quite famous abong the other engineers. They were focusing on shirts, and they had other complimentary items such as sweaters and cardigans. I became very fond of the cardigans, because of their versatility and because of their material…they were woolen. They had a nice touch; the material was breathable and they kept me warm while committing to the center for work.

However, the company messed things up. Slowly, year after year, they started reducing the quality of their products. I will not comment on the shirts, for which thank God I found a ton of alternatives, but I will focus on their wollen cardigans and sweaters. Through the years they reduced the thickness of the fabric, the softness, they messed up the sized, and they delivered products with several imperfections. This was systematic through the years, as I made several purchases. At some point, this became a joke at home, as each time we were speculating what will get worse this time. Anyway, after last time I promised to myself to never buy from them again.

Yet, I did not unsubscribe from their newsletter, it was something that I had neglected doing. Until I did. In the unsubscribe form, there was a field where they were asking why I wanted to unsubscribe. There, I gave in detail all the things that I had noticed, and additionally I gave them my input about their shirts (that they are a mess to iron, they are not cheap compared to international quality brands, that they do not have non-iron and more).

I got an automated reply for unsubscribing. And all the texts were messed up, rending the message unreadable. So, in the end, they couldn’t even fix their mailing list. How could they fix their sweaters?

Conclusion:

Sometimes we really care. We do not want to complain, we want to give helpful feedback. If I see it, then perhaps other people can see it. However, they cannot. They don’t want to? They cannot process it? They do not need? I do not know. All what I know is that I have sweater size 3XL and a size large from the same company that look the same, feel different and remind to never make the same mistake.