Rather, I think it was the element of surprise-of being handed that envelope out of the blue-that shifted the course of our evening, which until that point we’d tacitly agreed would follow the same trajectory it always did when we dined there (in, I suppose, a bid to relive the past one in which my father was still around). Perhaps subconsciously I’d tallied how much the gift certificate had saved me, and so decided to splurge on other menu items…but it didn’t feel like that was the case. Mom and I ordered several appetizers so that we could sample this and that, plate-sharing being a rarity for us, as well as a round of cocktails before we selected a wine, and when dessert was suggested we uncharacteristically opted for that, too. I think it was the element of surprise-of being handed that envelope out of the blue-that shifted the course of our evening, which until that point we’d tacitly agreed would follow the same trajectory it always did when we dined there.īut here’s another thing I wasn’t expecting: the freebie caused me to spend more money than I’d anticipated. I could still slap down my credit card with great magnanimity at the end of the night and thus be the recipient of all those endorphins gift-giving can trigger. While Mom’s friend had supplied us with a generous gift certificate, the amount would cover a nice bottle of wine rather than the whole meal. This, it turned out, was yet another unwarranted fear. Meaning the last thing I wanted was for some benevolent family friend to steal my thunder by picking up the check. I’d driven up to Vermont from Manhattan that morning, a five-hour slog in bad weather, dropped my wife and two sons off at my in-laws along the way, all so that I-Mom’s only child-could treat her to a birthday dinner. Fear, oddly enough, struck me again, or at the very least a feeling of deflation. “I hear it’s someone’s birthday,” the woman said, smiling as she pressed the envelope into my hand. What I wasn’t expecting-as we followed the hostess toward a two-top by the left of the fireplace-was for another member of the relatively new staff to stop us and hand me an envelope. Familiar sights assuaged us as soon as we arrived, from the clubby yet low-key atmosphere in the wood-paneled tavern to Mom’s favorite turkey croquettes still gracing the menu. Whatever the case, my fears were unwarranted. Perhaps we’d been avoiding the restaurant - how could it compare without Dad there, the guy who gabbed with every waiter and waitress and bartender, all of whom knew him by name? Or maybe Mom and I had been avoiding it because in our absence the restaurant had changed ownership. Mom and I hadn’t been back to the place since my father died three years ago. Some backstory…the restaurant occupies the ground floor of a country inn located in one of Vermont’s most quintessentially Vermont-y towns. This was all on my mind a few Saturdays ago when I took my mother to one of our favorite restaurants for her 82nd birthday. While success varies, the concept remains a sound and self explanatory one: enhance customer engagement with unexpected rewards.Īnd yet, as surprising and delightful as dining can be, it’s not exactly a tactic baked into most restaurant programming. These days, ‘surprise and delight’ is a tactic belonging to most brand’s marketing strategies.
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