The news reports are ablaze with reports of retail sales numbers for the 2009 Holiday Shopping Season.  Some retailers are up, others are down.  Most big retailers, like Kohls, Macys, and JC Penny are slashing prices and offering free shipping from their online stores. Retailers are even using social network sites like Facebook and Twitter to bring in customers on a minute-by-minute basis! Even in the flurry of holiday sales, you need to look forward to 2010.  THe first 10 years of the new century are gone.  What are you going to do differently? What are you doing to make sure that you get every possible dollar your customer has to spend?  Are your employees as committed?  Out of 100 customers, how many get the "full treatment" from each employee? I had a customer say that they were considering scaling down their secret shopping program because they were too busy at this time of year!  No way!  Hire more employees, offer overtime if you don't want to hire more people! Never compromise your sales process.  NEVER!  Once employees understand that it's OK to slack off, this is their new norm.  When was the last time you heard of a weatherman being 100% correct?  Never!  Why, because we expect that they'll be wrong most of the time -- and they are! We've got some ideas you might be interested in at The Service Quality Department's web site.  You can also check out ServiceQuality.US for additional ideas.