A few weeks ago my nine year old daughter and I had the pleasure of attending the Maple Leafs season ticket holder’s annual skating party at the Ricoh Coliseum. My daughter and I love this event and look forward to it every year. We arrived at the home of the Toronto Marlies decked out in our Leafs jerseys and matching Marlies toques. After spending close to an hour on the ice, we skated off to the change area to remove our skates and take a breather. Since we were rushing to get back to our car, we did not have time to check whether we had all of our belongings, and it so happend that my daughter lost her beloved toque, and needless to say, she was devastated.
My daughter has always loved leaving the house in matching hats with her dad and the prospect of no longer being able to do so left her quite upset. So we returned to the Coliseum and began to search. Despite spending what might seem like, to some, an unreasonable amount of time searching for a beanie, we still could not find the toque. One of the employees at the rink saw us looking around frantically and, despite his best efforts, was also unable to find her toque.
Instead of simply apologizing for the inconvenience and calling it quits, this employee went above and beyond his call of duty and tried to find us a replacement toque. Unable to do so, the employee returned with Marlies baseball caps, pens, and a backpack.
As a Hail Mary, we took a final look around and we were approached by another employee. This employee apologized to us for being unable to find the my daughter’s toque and left us her business card. A few days later I emailed her, just to see if anyone had been able to find the toque, and she informed me that they could not find it, but instead, she had found a replacement that she was having couriered directly to me. I was thoroughly impressed.
Here was an example of two employees who took a bad situation and, through their efforts and dedication to excellent customer service, turned it into an overwhelmingly positive one for myself and my family. While Toronto sports franchises are, now more than ever, certainly not without their difficulties, it is through the actions of employees like these and their dedication to customer service that will keep us fans of our teams for years to come.
Ricoh Coliseum
45 Manitoba Drive
Toronto, ON M6K 3C3
(416) 263-3900
