I was passing thru Charlotte early on a Saturday morning several years ago, and stopped at a McDonalds. Didn't realize it when I took the exit, but the place was dead in the middle of "the wrong side of town". Quite a few people in line at the counter, so I just assumed that, when I got to the counter at some point in the distant future, I'd be greeted by the typical mindless stare and "what the hell do you want" attitude.
As I stood there and watched, I soon realized this place operated with a smooth efficiency like I'd never seen before in my (far too often) visits to fast food joints. The manager was a black guy who looked to be in his mid-30's, and he was right there on the front line with the troops, bouncing from place to place, pulling drinks, setting up trays, and generally doing whatever was necessary to keep things moving. He seemed to be able to tell when one of his employees was on the verge of a slack moment before the employee himself realized it, and had quietly given that employee some new task as he passed by, never missing a step in his own work. The attitudes of the employees would've made you think they were all making 30 bucks an hour for playing video games instead of minimum wage for dealing with the cross section of bozos that make up much of "the public".
As I was eating, the manager passed thru the dining area picking up this and that, and checking to see if the food was satisfactory. I told him he ran the best McDonalds I'd ever visited, and that, if I had even a fourth of his ability to manage people, I'd be a rich man. He grinned from ear to ear and stopped to chat for a minute. He said all he did was try to make sure every customer was treated the way he liked to be treated when he walked into any business with the intention of spending his money, and that every employee knew all they had to do was to display that same attitude toward the customers, and he'd treat them as good as their momma and daddy ever did. If they couldn't, they obviously needed to work somewhere else, because he refused to employ kids he couldn't be nice to.
Pretty simplistic approach to customer service, but it sure seemed far more effective than all the "you're #1 with us" slogans and other ad-man crap used by people who don't have a clue. When a fellow will work that hard to make sure you want to come back and buy another dollar biscuit, its doubtful he'd have to travel around begging for a second chance if he were selling machines with 6-figure pricetags.