For a company involved in Food Service Equipment, the Service Department is the fundamental building block to offer excellent customer service from the technical point of view and complete support in managing the customer’s various needs.
We asked Giuliano Scarpa Service Director at Lainox how these levels can be reached and what are the goals.
Who is Giuliano Scarpa?
I was born in Venice in 1964 and I live in Mestre with my wife and daughter. My first job was in the computer industry, where I worked for over a decade. In 2000 I accepted a challenge by complete changing fields and becoming involved in food service equipment. The company had recently opened its Italian branch and in almost fifteen years I managed to developed a well-trained and long-established assistance network. In 2014 I took on a new challenge, deciding to embark on this new adventure
What made you accept Lainox?
I always viewed LAINOX as demonstrating Italian excellence in the industry so when the project and product were presented to me, I discovered its technological level and, finding the solutions that I felt were necessary for the future, the choice was easy. The desire to take on new challenges and the opportunity to transfer my experience in an Italian company convinced me to take the opportunity that was offered.
What should the ideal service department in a company that works with Food Service Equipment be like?
In my opinion, it should aim to offer complete service to the customer, offering complete support that is not limited only to the technical aspect.
To ensure customer satisfaction we must understand and be knowledgeable of their needs. Our clients include restaurant owners, cooking centre supervisors and those who are responsible for equipment for a chain as well as dealers and help centres.
Service should take care of their various needs, offering added value solutions in order to improve the use experience for the final customer and make loyal technical/commercial partners.
What are your short and medium term goals?
We are working on two fronts. Internally we want to increase collaboration and information exchange between the other departments in order to share information, creating continuous product improvement. We have weekly quality meetings to discuss what is happening in the market and share solutions introduced in production. Externally we are preparing new agreements to be proposed to all our partners in order to define standards of service and lay out a path for growth. We are also working to renew and standardise training and find more opportunities to be close to our partners with the objective being to improve their skills, understand their needs and guide their growth.
Today Service is not only simply post-sales service but it often becomes crucial in product choice and greatly impacts sales. How do you intend to set Lainox's service apart from its competitors in the market?
The ultimate objective is to develop innovative services and offers. With the tools available today, we can already offer active control of the customer's units, but not all of our partners are capable of taking advantage of this potential. With future developments and adequate training, we continue to offer our customers a system that is able to monitor and proactively signal any abnormal situations in order to allow them to organise interventions before the customer calls.