The Customer Service Lessons of Covid

When I started Saatva 10 years ago, I did it because the experience of shopping for a mattress was broken. There was no transparency around pricing, manufacturers made it impossible for people to comparison shop, you couldn’t get real information about what was in the product you were buying. And forget about service—if a customer had a problem, the retailer blamed the manufacturer, the manufacturer blamed the retailer, and the customer got caught in the middle.

I wanted to change all of that. As an online brand, we put our spec sheet right on the site and encouraged people to shop around to see our value. We made customer service the foundation of the business, with sleep guides available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. As Saatva grew, we developed a pristine reputation for service. That’s how we came to be the dominant player in the online luxury mattress marketplace. 

Then Covid hit. For the first time in our history, we were facing supply chain and manufacturing delays that we couldn’t control. Components like foams, latex, wood, and steel were in short supply across the industry, and procedures to insure safe conditions for factory workers meant it took longer to hand-craft each of our made-to-order mattresses. 

At the same time, the pandemic turned more consumers into online shoppers. Interest in Saatva’s products—affordable luxury mattresses, made in the U.S.A. with eco-friendly, organic materials and anti-bacterial fabrics—soared. But Covid restrictions meant we couldn’t manufacture and deliver our mattresses as quickly as we always had.

And we began to hear about it. Calls to our customer service lines increased. People reached out on our social media channels. And I was forced for the first time to acknowledge that not every Saatva customer was getting the experience we had always touted. 

As hard as it has been to get that kind of feedback, the last six months have taught me a few important things that will stay with me even after the pandemic is over. 

There’s no excuse for poor communication. When a customer places an order with us, they get a target delivery date. In most parts of the country we hit our dates. But in some regions where we had delays, we could have done a better job communicating the timeline to customers. 

Since then, we’ve gone out of our way to let people know from the time of order that it may take longer. We’ve put messaging on our site, and I personally send an email to every customer whose order is delayed. What I’ve learned is that people understand, especially right now, and they’re willing to wait for our mattresses—they just want communication. And if someone can’t or won’t wait, we refund their money, no questions asked. 

Some things can’t be rushed. To meet the demand, we’re adding more customer service reps, more white-glove delivery partners, more manufacturing capability. For a company like ours, which puts a premium on service, there’s no way to shortchange the onboarding and training process. We want to make sure every new sleep guide knows what they need to know to be truly helpful to customers. I’m proud that we’ve been able to ramp up as quickly as we have at a time when everyone in the company is working remotely and factories are dealing with new spacing standards. 

 Stay focused on your mission.  When Covid hit, our factories pivoted to mask-making, donating hundreds of thousands of masks to EMTs, law enforcement, and other front-line workers while continuing to fulfill mattress orders for our customers. Even as we shifted to working remotely in our New York and Austin offices, we kept our commitment to mentoring New York City public school students through our partnership with the nonprofit organization PENCIL, expanding our virtual programs beyond what we are able to do in person. In spite of the logistical challenges, it was important that we not lose sight of what Saatva stands for as a company. 

Always strive to be better. As CEO, I’m thankful to the people who have shown us their support through this time, not just with their business but also through their messages on social media and elsewhere. Their feedback helps us grow as a company. And I couldn’t be more grateful to Saatva’s employees and the thousands of factory workers and delivery partners across the country who continue to work as hard as they can to serve our customers better every single day.

This article has been reposted on LinkedIn.