ELECTRONIC HOUSE CALL - October 4, 2002

After a week or so at home, I am off to northwest Arkansas for a distributor food show on Tuesday. Keep those frequent flyer miles coming!

THE NUMBERS GAME
The EHC subscriber list is presently over 2300 ... very encouraging considering that I have never promoted this weekly diary, but it is right on the cusp of being unwieldy. I have arbitrarily set 2500 as the point at which I can no longer effectively manage this list on my own. This means that very shortly I will have to turn the management of the list over to a service. While that will mean that I will no longer get to personally deal with every subscriber, it seems to be the only way to continue to be responsive as the list grows. If this impending change will have any impact on you or how you receive the EHC, I will let you know.

HERE WE GO AGAIN
As if the Klez virus wasn't persistent enough, it looks like there is a new -- and very nasty -- bug on the blockthe BugBear virus. When it infects a machine, it sends fake e-mails from that machine, masquerading as real e-mails. This can cause a lot of confusion and worry. For more information, go to the Symantec Web site: http://securityresponse.symantec.com/avcenter/venc/data/w32w32.bugbear@mm.html

To protect against this new critter, make sure that you have your anti-virus software is completely up to date ... and as always, be especially careful of opening e-mail with attachments.

SHORT TAKES
A few stray thoughts from my perpetual notebook

When you have two possible courses of action to choose from, go with the one that scares you. That will always prove to be the path of greatest growth.

Never talk to a guest while you are moving. The message is that you have something more important going on. STAND AND DELIVER!

Instead of beating on your crew about pre-bussing (a strange term at best), what if you set a standard that there would be nothing on the table that was not needed for the service at that point in the meal?

If you have a standard, but compromise it on occasion ... you don't have a standard.

HOUSE CALLS FROM THE DOC
Marketing guru Joel Cohen and I are bringing our Odd Couple Restaurant Sales-Building Workshop to Milwaukee on October 16, Eau Claire on October 17, South Carolina during the first week of November and to Louisville just before Thanksgiving. For more information, go to www.oddcouple.net

I will also be joining crack restaurant marketers Rory Fatt and Michael Attias for a marketing seminar in Phoenix on November 11th. Details are on my website at www.restaurantdoctor.com

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