Acts of Unreasonable Hospitality: Park Place Motors

Unreasonable Hospitality by Will Guidara has been used at multiple leadership events and training sessions throughout Luther in the last year. The book follows Will Guidara, former co-owner of the restaurant Eleven Madison Park (EMP) in New York City, and their transformation of becoming The World’s Best Restaurant The main concept is how you can create little moments for your guests that make a big impact on their experience, also known as unreasonable hospitality.

Guidara’s career-changing moment came when he served a two-dollar hot dog to out-of-town customers at his four-star restaurant. The move created a personalized experience and earned a positive reaction from his guests. EMP worked to create these moments for every guest, from making a teddy bear on the spot for a dad who forgot to buy one for one of his children at home to feeding the parking meter so a guest could continue enjoying their dinner. These Unreasonable Hospitality ideas and themes can also be applied to providing excellent service for guests at our dealerships. 

Brad Johnson, General Manager at Park Place Motors, recently went to a restaurant famous for their malts in Rochester, Minnesota. Rochester is well-known for the Mayo Clinic, the first and largest Mayo Center that has 45,000 employees to the 120,000 people that live in Rochester. Johnson sat next to a couple, both with Mayo Clinic badges on, who debated getting a malt but eventually decided not to. Johnson decided to send two to their table. 

“They were shocked when two malts showed up on their table,” said Johnson. “They kept asking who ordered these.”

Their waitress told them, and Johnson started talking to the couple. They eventually started to talk about cars and what they do for work. The woman mentioned she liked BMWs and when Johnson said he works at Park Place Motors, which sells BMWs, they said they would visit to check out some new cars. Within the month, the couple had ordered a new BMW from Park Place Motors that arrived a few weeks later. Unreasonable Hospitality isn’t about selling as much as you can to a guest; it’s about making their experience better than they could even imagine. 

“It was kind of an opportunity just to spend twenty bucks and get an opportunity just to talk with them,” said Johnson. Johnson didn’t know if they were in the market for a car or if they liked the brand at Park Place Motors, but he still went out of his way to make the couple’s dining experience better and that good fortune came back around.