Navigating Customer Service Challenges with Empathy
"Are you saying this is my fault?" That's what an employee actually said to Lori during one of the most emotional weeks of her life — and it's the spark for this episode's conversation. Vonda and Lori have talked customer service plenty of times before, but this week both of them landed on the customer side of a bad interaction, and the lessons for flower shops are impossible to miss.
First, a word about butterflies
Fresh off a trip to Oklahoma for her mother-in-law Esther's 92nd birthday, Lori opened with a cautionary tale about finishing touches. One of the arrangements delivered to Esther featured a butterfly so flimsy and ugly it made Lori genuinely angry — the kind of dollar-store pick that falls off and can't be reattached. The lesson: if you're adding a finishing touch like a butterfly, make it good quality, because customers really do look at that detail. Recipients like Esther keep the good ones. The cheap ones end up in the trash within 24 hours.
"It may not be your fault, but it is your responsibility"
The heart of the episode is Lori's experience advocating for her father, who has Alzheimer's and lives in an independent senior living facility nine hours away. Her family pays extra for weekly cleaning, laundry, and check-ins — and on her visit she found overflowing trash, a filthy sink, and a laundry basket that clearly hadn't been touched. When she calmly asked about it at the front desk, the young man on duty shrugged, "We're short staffed," and pushed a clipboard at her: her dad was supposed to sign up if he needed something. Her dad, who doesn't have the cognitive ability to know what he needs, let alone sign a board in the lobby.
Then came the line that sent her over the edge: "Are you saying this is my fault?" Staff kept blaming new ownership, passing the buck, throwing their own company under the bus. Nobody took responsibility. And that's the point Lori wants every shop owner to hear: it may not be your employee's fault, but it is their responsibility, because they represent the company. Lori is now moving her dad out — and when friends ask about the place, she tells them exactly why. An unhappy customer you don't de-escalate doesn't just leave; they never recommend you again.
Grief makes customers irrational — and that's okay
Lori connected her own raw emotions to something every florist sees: the sympathy customer with a complaint that isn't rational. She recalled a shop owner describing a customer upset that a funeral plant wasn't the darker color she'd pictured. Irrational? Completely. But that customer felt the plant was the last thing she could do for her grandmother. You're never going to know how deep the grief goes. The job isn't necessarily to replace the plant — it's to save the sale and the relationship by acknowledging the feeling first.
Vonda had her own brush with it, delivering funeral flowers for her daughter-in-law's mother in Iowa, where a young funeral director treated her with dismissive attitude at every turn — while an older colleague showed exactly the respect and care the job demands. Same building, two employees, two completely different impressions of the business.
The phrases that de-escalate
Drawing from the empathy presentation she gave at NextGen, Lori shared the verbiage that turns a confrontation into a conversation:
- "I'm so sorry you're facing this — let me get someone and let's figure this out."
- "Tell me more of your story." / "Thanks for reaching out about this — what's going on?"
- "Your concern is valid. I hear you."
- "I'd feel the same way if I were in your shoes."
- "What would be most helpful for you moving forward?" / "What can we do to make this right?"
Even if the employee can't fix the problem, making the customer feel heard changes everything. And the stakes are real: as Lori shared from her slides, employee empathy directly impacts customer satisfaction and loyalty, and up to 65% of a company's revenue comes from loyal customers. Customers don't judge your whole shop — they judge it by the one person who helped them, which is why the hosts say you're only as good as your worst employee.
Key takeaways
- Never let anyone on your team say "it's not my fault." It may not be their fault, but it is their responsibility.
- Grieving customers can be irrational — acknowledge the emotion first, then solve the problem.
- Equip every customer-facing employee with de-escalation phrases; at minimum, "I hear you're upset — let me get someone to help you."
- Customer service training isn't one-and-done. Run refreshers before busy season, the way smart members re-run their teams through Sales Prep School.
- Sweat the finishing touches — quality details like butterflies and picks are what customers notice and keep.