"Great Customer Service is Great Customer Service," Says Safelite's New VP
August 25, 2011

Renee Cacchillo

Renee Cacchillo joined Safelite AutoGlass in the newly created role of vice president, service delivery, on August 15. Cacchillo is new to the auto glass industry, but has 25 years of experience of a variety of consumer-based companies that are national in scale, such as Bob Evans, Mimi's Café restaurants, Bath & Body Works/Limited Brands, Accenture, Hallmark and Dillard Department Stores, and spent some time this week discussing her background and plans for Safelite with glassBYTEs.com™/AGRR™ magazine.

glassBYTEs.com (GB): What does your new role entail?
Cacchillo (RC): It includes customer experience, so when we have customers who want to contact us and want to share how their experience went as well as the how we run surveys in the field. It also includes labor management, which is new, as well as total net conversion, which is something that Safelite's been working on for years. (Editor's Note: Click here for more about total net conversion at Belron, Safelite's parent company.)

GB: I understand you have a variety of experience in numerous industries. What differences have you seen so far in the auto glass industry from your previous experience, and what is the same?
RC: I wouldn't be the expert to answer on that quite yet, seeing that I'm so new in my role and I'm still learning the auto glass industry as well as Safelite, but I would say that great customer service is great customer service, and that customers do expect a great experience whenever they purchase a product or service from any provider, and so half of it is really making sure that team members that are satisfying and delivering that customer service to your customer, along with understanding what those expectations look like and how they're being measured by the customer.

GB: What will you be focusing on first?
RC: I'd say right now it's a bit early to answer that, because there are a lot of different vectors and operations and levers that all work together, and so I'm really just trying to find out where we are and what our end goals look like. The other factor I failed to mention that is critical is that when a customer contacts Safelite, or any company for that matter, is that we're really very consistent in how we deliver that service, and that they can rely on us time and time again, and expect the service that they're going to get would be consistent no matter if they receive it in Utah, California, Texas, or here in Ohio.

GB: What strategies do you plan to utilize to communicate that consistency to employees across the United States?
RC: I think the important thing is whether it's the surveys that you deploy, or whether it's the key factors that you understand drive your satisfaction rate or your loyalty rate or score. Whether it's speed, or for a restaurant perspective your hospitality, or whether it's your loyalty score, [employees need to] understand how those things are measured and which ones they control. You also start to learn over time from the field which things the customer really cares about. Then when you communicate those, you can share those best practices, and that's how everyone in the field in an organization can start to execute those in a consistent fashion.

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