Last train to the end

[austin_dern]

One of the side benefits of spaceroo's visit several months back was actually finding a Subway sandwich shop. I'd seen signs for them all over the place, but somehow never found an actual shop. And, alas, while I'm a sucker for nearly any membership club/discount scheme, I found them too late for the Sub Club; they've put up signs announcing the discontinuing of the scheme because of alleged forged stamps. Because, you know, the Frank Abagnales of today are all about scamming their way to a free six-inch meatball hoagie. Would it have hurt them to say ``we just don't feel like running it anymore''?

I noticed also a fast food place being constructed within the Suntec City mall; they're hiring, for those interested in service positions in another country. The rather enthusiastic hiring poster reads: We are one of Singapore's premium QSR chain operator [ sic ], seeking bubbly, dynamic, and highly motivated individuals with positive attitude to join our team.

We believe that satisfying all our guests' [ sic ] means giving them a total experience on each of their visits. If you have what it takes, come and be part of our team today!

Putting aside that I have no idea what a QSR chain operator would be, my nitpick-oriented mind can't help noticing that a ``total experience'' is not synonymous with ``good experience'', which is what I believe they want. Plus, you know, it's a fast food place. When I go to one I don't want a total experience; I want a hamburger cooked just about right. I suppose it's good to seek bubbly people, but there's only so much bubbly-ness I can take in mundane chores like ordering a hamburger, and I hope they don't go far above my threshold of bubbly.

Trivia: By 1875 London's Central Telegraph Office had 450 telegraph instruments and 68 internal pneumatic tubes for quick messaging. Source: The Victorian Internet, Tom Standage.

Currently Reading: Squaring the Circle and other Monographs, EW Hobson, HP Hudson, AN Singh, AB Kempe.

Comments

[patchoblack.livejournal.com]

Actually, I can understand them discontinuing a promotion due to wide-spread fraud. From what you said, it sounds like one of those "Buy a certain number of subs, get the next one free" offers. This takes into consideration a certain amount of profits from the purchased subs to off-set the free ones. Therefore, if a bunch of folks are scamming their way to a bunch of free subs, well, there is only so far they will let such a thing slide before they have to cry foul and stop the promotion. Not to meantion the ill-will they feel from folks feeling they have a right to con their way to free food.

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

The trouble is I just don't believe in the existence of wide-spread fraud. I could see, I suppose, someone or other going to the bother to prove it could be done, but ... it's just kind of sad to go to this trouble for a free S$6.00 sandwich. It'd be a lot more sensible to try forging customer cards for a DVD store or the like, where you can get something worth more and of longer use or greater resale value.

[spaceroo.livejournal.com]

Inexpensive scanners and color inkjet printers have made counterfeiting an easy, home-grown affair. It's sad, but it's quite likely all stamp collection sort of promotions will end up following the dodo into oblivion. It's just too much to expect an overworked clerk to be able to distinguish at a glance a genuine stamp from something some jerk printed on their $50 HP Deskjet 666WTF.

Once enough stores are equipped my guess is the "Sub Club" will come back in the form of a smart card. Which is a lot less charming and engaging then stamp collecting, but... at least they can pretend it's more tamper proof.

[orv.livejournal.com]

The problem could be pretty easily solved by printing UV-reactive ink on the stamps. This is easy for a clerk to check with a small blacklight, which many stores already have for checking for counterfeit currency. I'd wager this would be cheaper than deploying smart cards, and would result in fewer irate customers, since my experience suggests that smart cards don't like being carried around in wallets.

Of course, other chains use punch cards instead and apparently don't have any problems.

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

And ultraviolet lights are becoming -- if not abundant, at least not rare in stores, as a way of validating bills and whatnot. It wouldn't be at all a challenge to keep the stickers around.

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

I don't need smart cards. I've got enough membership cards as it is, between the Kinokuniya, this place in Funan the IT Mall, the zoo membership, the MRT card, uh ... a bunch of other ones, including the staff card I actually sort of need nearly daily. What I want is more fun stuff.

[oliver-otter.livejournal.com]

When I go to one I don't want a total experience; I want a hamburger cooked just about right.

You're being way too picky. In fast food you should be aiming for, "Tastes OK enough to stay down, and contains neither foreign substances nor germs in sufficient quantities to harm you."

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

Oh, no, there's plenty of places to eat. I can be as fussy as I want, to a good first approximation.

Besides, I'm a foreign substance around these parts.

[moonfires.livejournal.com]

QSR=Quick Service Restaurant :>

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

Ah, that makes sense ... alas, Singapore has an acronym addiction so severe that it would make an SMS chat room look verbose.

[moonfires.livejournal.com]

It's also in use in the US, but more as a term as the industry uses to refer to itself when talking to investment banks or among others of the kind.

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

Ah, so it's one of those terms invented so that they can sound more elite and fancy and high-tech. I guess they feel more confident trying to arrange an instrument of debenture if the other people in the room aren't thinking too often about Willard Scott in plastic orange pants.

[chefmongoose.livejournal.com]

Exactly. Like the phrase 'fast-casual', which I generally take to mean "We still don't have waiters but our food is better than the QSR". Or, "You're going to pay $8 for that Panera Bread sandwich."

--Chiaroscuro

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

I haven't seen a name for that sort of restaurant, but I know the kind. That's more or less where I tend to end up eating on the weekends, typically a place where I turn in my order on a notepad and get it later on.

[rcoony.livejournal.com]

I don't go to Subway much anymore these days, but we did stop at one a few months back.. I think my dad got a card with a magnetic stripe on it, so I figured they just changed to those. I could be wrong though.

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

I've discovered a rather curious phenomenon along the way, too. I didn't much eat Subway sandwiches in the US because no matter how big a sandwich I got, I didn't feel less hungry after eating them. But here, they're good to keep me full for several hours, often till bedtime. I don't know why. They can't be all that different, can they?

[rcoony.livejournal.com]

Well, don't they make metric sandwiches out there or something?

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

They are metric, yes, although they do explain the lengths as six-inch and twelve-inch, and give their estimated lengths in centimeters for convenience.

[luckybunny007.livejournal.com]

Supposedly the major problem was employees nicking rolls of the stamps they used for the Sub Club and flogging them on EBay. Who needs fancy printers?

[austin-dern.livejournal.com]

That would avoid most of the problems of finding someone sad enough to counterfeit the stamps, but I've still got to doubt that this happened all that much. At least when Borders cancelled their 10-percent discount club card they were upfront and said they didn't want to run it anymore.