My Star Wars!
I've only done four reviews on Google. So I'm not a veteran of the Star Wars front or a Google Maps marshal.
But my four ratings have one characteristic: they are extreme. When I really liked a place, I gave it five stars. When I left dissatisfied, I gave it one.
Among the positive reviews is a modest byrektore in Mbrostar, which has now become a pit stop whenever I pass by. I also gave a simple, almost makeshift, place in Borsh five stars. The beach was clean, the food was very good, and the service was also good. I even mentioned the young waiter who served us by name.
It gives me pleasure that this positive assessment has been seen by thousands of people. Perhaps someone stopped there even after those few lines.
But I also wrote two one-star reviews, both for luxury restaurants.
One was about a once very good restaurant in Durres, where I waited almost an hour and the quality of the food was disappointing. However, I gave the waiter's behavior high marks.
The other one was even harsher, but completely deserved. I had been invited to a dinner with a group of foreigners, in perhaps one of the most expensive bars in Tirana. The music was so loud that I couldn't hear the person next to me. I asked several times for the volume to be lowered, just a little, but my requests yielded about the same result as a person who throws himself into the sea.
The review was very negative, but not blindly. I gave the food a 4 out of 5, while the service and atmosphere a 1. So, the chef was found not guilty. The manager and the waiter were punished. Nearly two thousand people saw the review.
From the restaurant? No answer, no question, no apology, no attempt to understand what had happened. Not even the standard formula: "We're sorry your experience didn't meet expectations," that sentence that today artificial intelligence produces before the manager has finished his morning coffee.
This impresses me especially today, when Albania is involved in what we could call the Star Wars.
Following public reactions from a handful of business owners to the protest and protesters, an organized campaign has been launched to negatively evaluate a limited number of restaurants and hotels.
I understand the anger. I even understand it. When a business owner decides to enter into public debate, to belittle or insult protesters, he cannot be expected to calmly go back behind the counter and say: politics is politics, business is business. Especially in capitalism, where the customer is king, not a shooting target.
Yesterday, the director of the State Police stated that the police will investigate the issue of the reviews. In a country with problems of organized crime, wanted fugitives, drug trafficking and corruption, the idea of the police standing up for restaurant stars is, at the very least, an interesting choice of priorities.
Threaten the Prime Minister with your life on social media and nothing will happen to you. Dare to give a restaurant one star and the police will rise up, led by the major manager with two stars.
But precisely because the police response is disproportionate, we should not fall into the same trap of lack of measure.
A negative review from a customer who has been to the bar, paid the bill, and shared their experience is one thing, but a thousand negative reviews, coordinated by people who have never set foot in that business, are something else.
In the first case, the client speaks, in the second, the crowd speaks.
And the crowd, even when its anger is legitimate, does not always have the right target.
If Star Wars goes off the rails, the wet can burn along with the dry. Behind a hotel is not just the owner who made an IDIOT and arrogant statement. There are receptionists, waiters, cooks, cleaners, suppliers and families who live on those salaries. It's a whole chain.
This does not mean that the client should remain silent. On the contrary.
Review is one of the most democratic instruments of modern capitalism. A single client can tell thousands of people about his experience. He does not need television, newspapers, parties and, until yesterday, not even permission from the police.
My best experience with reviews isn't about luxury restaurants. It's about the satisfaction that a positive review for a modest business has been seen by thousands of potential customers.
The worst experience is not the bad food, the hour-long wait, or the music that makes you seek acoustic asylum. It's the silence. The disregard. The fact that a customer writes publicly about a bad experience, thousands of people read it, and the business doesn't care at all to understand what happened.
Owners who want to play politics by belittling customers or protesters, I believe, have gotten the message.
The yellow card has been issued. But despite the yellow card, the game continues, it is not a signal for everyone to enter the field. Because when the crowd decides to do justice with stars, the only thing that comes out with five stars in the end is chaos. /Taken from the author's Facebook page.
