THE EXTRA IMPORTANCE OF GOOD CUSTOMER SERVICE IN A TOUGH ECONOMY

While visiting the Pagosa Baking Company recently I encountered a group of six Hispanic women that were ordering food and coffee at the counter. As I often do with strangers, I asked where they were from and what they were doing in Pagosa. The spokesperson for the group, speaking perfect English responded that they were all from San Antoino, Texas, in town to enjoy early season skiing and snowboarding. She went on to explain that all the women were best friends or related and that they typically take 2-3 trips together each year. This was their first visit to Pagosa Springs. I asked them what they thought of our little town. Interestingly, she said the scenery was gorgeous, the food, especially at the PBS was great, as was the skiing, but that they were treated a bit rudely on several occasions when they revealed they were from Texas. She said they experienced this unfortunate reception on two occasions, once during a visit to a local store and the other time while eating in one of our restaurants; I might add it was not the PBS, Kips, Alley House, Farrago’s, or Summit Ski and Sports, ( I always look out for the merchants in my end of town.) Anyway, I assured them that what they experienced was rare, and certainly not the attitude the majority of the folks in Pagosa Springs have towards Texans, or visitors from any other state. I went on to explain that we love our tourists and want to be sure they have a great experience while visiting our area. She warmed up a little and went on to explain that they were a bit surprised at the rough reception because they live in an area of Texas that gets a lot of outside visitors and their community really encourages that and their Chamber of Commerce helps their merchants to improve their customer service with regular workshops, speakers and training. I did everything I could to give them the best face of Pagosa I could and encouraged them to not judge us by the two bad apples they encountered.

I recall, probably 8-10 years ago that the Downtown Merchants group in Durango had a presentation by a marketing consultant that gave them the results of exit interviews with tourists in the Durango region. The single common negative content in the feedback was poor customer service and attitude. I high number of respondents commented that they were often treated by clerks and wait staff as though they were an inconvenience.  A lack of a friendly greeting and a seldom heard “thank you” at the end of a transaction were regular comments from survey respondents.  Durango then when about to promote significant changes to their customer service. They started by empowering their business owners and their employees with an understanding of the importance of delivering excellent customer service, to all the patrons of its stores, shops and restaurants. I don’t recall following up, or whether Durango did a follow up survey, but, from my experience as a regular consumer and visitor in Durango over the last five years, I would say they made substantial improvements.

Here in Pagosa, we can all learn from my brief conversation with the ladies from San Antonio as well as the experience of business owners in Durango. We are a service oriented economy, driven by tourism. Our visitors are spending discretionary dollars that they can direct anywhere they wish. There are many communities here in the Rockies and elsewhere competing for tourists. If we want to attract them and get them to return in greater numbers, we need to treat them like gold. They have the economic power to make or break our community.  If we really understand this relationship, we will all brush up on our customer service skills. There are plenty of resources available to help any business owner or conscientious employee in this area. Here are a  couple:

Inc. Magazine Article:

http://www.inc.com/guides/improve-your-companys-customer-service.html

This article is like putting your mouth over a fire hydrant and cranking the valve open!

http://www.slideshare.net/Batjaa_sh/101-ways-to-improve-customer-service

COMMUNITY BANKS OF COLORADO

262 PAGOSA STREET, PAGOSA SPRINGS, CO

In one of my earlier Blog Articles last month I mentioned the Bank Ratings of a couple of our local lending institutions. Shortly after I launched that article on the Blog Site, a former member of the local lending scene was shut down and its deposits, loans and non-performing assets were transferred to another bank.

Community Banks of Colorado began lending in our area in 2001 from their office in Durango, Colorado. Eventually, during a growth period they decided they should open a branch here in Pagosa Springs, eventually opening a total of 40 banking locations.  For several years they were located on the street level of the Town Terrace Building at 262 Pagosa Street, just east of the former Victoria’s Restaurant Building. They never really had much impact in the local market and being a relatively late entrant to the real estate boom period here, they didn’t capture the best of the available lending business. When they began to grow their lending activities in our area they were competing with more established lenders, many of which had the best business tied up. Community Banks of Colorado found itself bidding for business from the riskier developers and marginal projects that were looking for construction financing in 2005-2007. Pagosa Springs, Colorado properties within Town Terrace and Aspen Village were financed by Community Banks of Colorado as well as other smaller speculative housing projects.

While things were booming here in Southwest Colorado, management of Community Banks of Colorado decided to expand further west and went on a buying binge in Central California. At the time the housing market was exploding with an abundance of new large housing tracts attracting homebuyers commuting into the San Francisco Bay Area in order to find affordable housing. It seemed as though the market would continue to grow, but shortly after moving into the area, the market started to slow down and then came to a complete stand still.

Read Part Two…

In Part One we talked about the history of Community Banks of Colorado in the Pagosa Springs market.

When things turned south in the California markets, the markets Community Banks of Colorado was in within Colorado began to slow down and suddenly their non-performing loans ballooned out of control. Initially they worked feverishly to work with their large borrowers to try to restructure loans in order to avoid taking them in foreclosure. This is often a tactic used to buy time in hopes a short term problem doesn’t extend into a long term crisis, but this time the problems grew and the timeframe expanded.

The Bank watched as its capital eroded way beyond the levels permitted by banking regulators. Fortunately for the Bank, there were so many other banks in their district that were larger and in deeper trouble that they were able to remain somewhat under the radar for a time. Community Banks of Colorado had become a Zombie Bank; a walking dead, waiting for plot to be readied at the cemetery. Eventually the bank examiners caught up with them, issuing their first written reprimand and warning letter in March of 2009. Subsequently, on February 8^th of this year a “Prompt Corrective Action Directive” was issued which effectively sealed its fate. This Directive, issued by the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System instructs the Bank that it has 90 days to raise sufficient new capital to regain solvency, or to arrange for its sale to another solvent banking entity. Typically these Directives are extended once or twice if the regulators feel there is progress being made, or, if their current workload does not provide them adequate time to arrange a merger or liquidation of the bank.

Officials arrived at the bank facilities at closing time last Friday, without advance notice as the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation was appointed receiver for the 40 branches of Community Bank of Colorado, including branches in Durango, Cortez, South Fork, Del Norte and Alamosa, Colorado.  A friend of mine that worked on the receivership team for FDIC related to me how they would secretly check into the towns with banks they were closing using fictitious identities one to two days ahead of the bank closures. This was one of the precautions they practiced to avoid a run on the bank by local depositors.

Bank Midwest of Kansas City, Missouri entered into a purchase and assumption agreement to assume all the deposits of Community Banks of Colorado.  The FDIC and Bank Midwest also entered into a loss share agreement on $714.2 million of the total of $1.38 billion in total assets, with FDIC estimating a total loss to the FDIC of around $224.9 million. Bank Midwest is protected against any losses sustained among the assets it agreed to assume. You can view the related FDIC press release here.

Within the pile of assets being transferred to Bank Midwest are several loans within the Aspen Village development here in Pagosa Springs, Colorado. How will the new owner of that debt deal with our struggling local economy? Will they exercise more forbearance, giving our area more time to get on more solid footing? Or, with the loan loss guarantees of the FDIC, will they move swiftly to liquidate assets and return as much cash to its coffers as quickly as possible? The borrowers and tenants of the properties involved will be watching how things unfold later this month.

It is interesting to note that on September 30, 2010, the net worth reported for Community Banks of Colorado was $82.7 million. So, it would appear then when all is said and done, according to the estimate stated by FDIC, the estimated losses of $224.9 million will be nearly three times the value held by the bank’s shareholders a year earlier. Permitting these type of Zombie Banks to continue to exist any longer than absolutely necessary seems a vast waste of resources.

For information on real estate in Southwest Colorado, be sure to visit our website: www.pagosasource.com