Closed for business. Be happy!

Posted by Jon
If the pre-stay welcoming email from the first of my Atlanta hotels wasn’t irritating enough, the conference hotel itself went one step further. Its communique observed:

We are delighted to announce that the Sun Dial Restaurant, Bar, & View is renewing your fine dining experience with a highly anticipated renovation. The restaurant will be closed April 29 to August 2013, but pleased be inspired to join us for brunch, lunch, and dinner at The Café and The Lobby Bar, located on level 5.

Now, I’m all in favour of hotels updating their facilities. And, just as in proposals, writers sometimes have to look for a positive spin on bad news. I’m guessing that the following would have been the most honest story:

Perhaps the most notable feature of our hotel is its 73rd floor restaurant, with 360 degree views over Atlanta. Unfortunately, you won’t get to enjoy it as it’ll be closed when you’re here.

So, maybe they could have been more apologetic:

Our Sun Dial restaurant will be closed for renovation during your stay, but you will still be able to join us…

… or  even…

We’re sorry that our  Sun Dial restaurant will be closed during your  stay, but…

Instead, they’re “delighted” we won’t get to experience it. I’m so pleased for the guests who’ll be staying with them from September – but please don’t patronise me. Because the only way I’d be happy would be were I a regular guest (and their systems could show that it’s nearly a decade since I was last there), or if  the truth is actually:

The Sun Dial restaurant really is dire. It’s shut. You should be thankful.

There’s a lesson in this for proposal writers. Sometime we do have to break bad news to the client – that, for example, we can’t quite meet their needs in the way that they have specified. We have to shine a more positive light on things, perhaps along the lines of, “instead we do this the following way, and evidence shows that this will enable you to achieve the same goals / realise the same benefits, but in a slightly different way”. Done well, non-compliances or weaknesses in your approach can be explained in a customer-friendly way – and evaluators do actually like vendors who appear to be honest. But we have to do so without sounding arrogant, patronising  or merely downright insenstive, as the Westin managed to do with their email.