My nightmare is a one-star review on Google

The customer who trusts you on your word

The American customer pays you by card, in advance, for a product they will see six months later. They trust you on your word. But if there is a problem, even if it isn't your fault, even if you are in the right, they don't care: “What do you want from me? Sort it out.” And they are right, because what they are buying is the certainty that everything will go well. At the high end, after-sales is part of the product.

Three real cases

We always quote for installation and the customer chooses. In Italy practically 100% take it. In the United States 30% do: the rest rely on their own fitter, and that's where the problems begin. One fitter wrecked half a kitchen. Another, moving the crates from the container to the house, broke four of them. And in Salt Lake City a customer needed four new cabinet doors: it isn't round the corner, and shipping a pallet free of charge by FedEx to Salt Lake City is not the height of efficiency.

What do you do? Charge the customer for the parts their fitter broke? No. We remade them ourselves. I went to see the client in New York in person, gave her a Gucci scarf for the inconvenience, and she was delighted. Because if the next morning she had photographed the wrecked kitchen and posted it with our name on it, it would have been a disaster of epic proportions. A three-hundred-euro scarf costs far less than a one-star review that stays there for ever.

My nightmare, at night, is someone giving me one star. People believe that more than all the photos I have ever taken.

5% for service

In an ideal world, installation by us would be compulsory. I leave it optional so as not to lose the sale when the customer insists on their trusted fitter. So I did what Rolex does: I raised the price list by 5% and set that 5% aside for customer service. One customer buys the kitchen, everything is perfect, and after-sales costs me nothing. There is always another one, for whom I have to remake the doors or send a technician to the other side of the world. Everyone's 5% pays for the service of those who need it, and nobody has to argue about who is right.

Why reviews matter more than advertising

An undecided customer, before coming to the showroom or paying a deposit online, does one thing: they read the reviews. They are the most-read marketing you have, and you don't write it. Sixty-six five-star reviews on Luxury Academy's profile tell someone weighing up a course more than any page on the website. A single one-star review among them is the first one people read.

That is why after-sales has to be designed the way you design the sale: who answers, how quickly, what gets remade without argument, what gets given away. At the high end the customer is also buying the peace of mind that, if something goes wrong, you will be there. Whether you give it to them or not, the customer will tell people.

From my classroom courses and my book Direct from Milano. Figures and examples updated to September 2026.