CT Challenger
New member
As we close in on the 200th report of a Canadian who has pledged to "never buy from Canadian Tire again", we should consider the implications of the number of such pledges.
For instance, this thread is being populated by just 1 or 2 people, and only for a couple of months. So, the relatively small number "200" shouldn't be taken as an indication of the total number of Canadians who have taken this pledge.
It is well-known in retailing, and in other failure analysis circles, that the number of reports drops off rapidly as one moves up the escalation chain.
This means that, for each person whose pledge has been reported on this site, there are easily 10 times as many Canadians out there who have made the same pledge elsewhere on the internet, but are not recorded here. So, there are likely to be at least 2,000 Canadians who have posted their pledge to boycott Canadian Tire somewhere on the internet.
But lots of people don't use the internet, yet still would have taken the same pledge, but announced it through other means, such as a written letter to Canadian Tire, or even just telling their friends. There are likely about 10 times as many such people, which would mean roughly 20,000 Canadians who have written about or spoken about their pledge.
And let's not forget that we Canadians tend to be a polite group, who are more likely to keep our upset and alienation to ourselves. It would be well within the norm for a Canadian who is treated badly by an identifiable brand, to simply 'suck it up', and privately vow to never darken that retailer's door again, without making a public announcement. Typical numbers are between 10 and 25 'silent complaints' for each verbalized complaint. So, it is not unreasonable to assume that roughly 200,000 Canadians have already vowed to 'never buy from Canadian Tire again'.
And all this is based on the small sample of Canadians who have been identified in the last few months. The actual number keeps rising sharply, which bodes ill for this once-venerated retailer.
Could there be a million Canadians who boycott all Canadian Tire stores?
2 million? 3?
Sure, the Crappy People who post here might try to hide from these numbers, and dismiss this as 'only 200 people who didn't even bother to post on Canadian Tire Sucks Dot Net'.
But if they were at all interested in "strong customer service", they would surely be taking every single one of these boycott declarations very seriously.
And they will only hurt themselves and their employees if they continue to bury their collective heads in the sand.
For instance, this thread is being populated by just 1 or 2 people, and only for a couple of months. So, the relatively small number "200" shouldn't be taken as an indication of the total number of Canadians who have taken this pledge.
It is well-known in retailing, and in other failure analysis circles, that the number of reports drops off rapidly as one moves up the escalation chain.
This means that, for each person whose pledge has been reported on this site, there are easily 10 times as many Canadians out there who have made the same pledge elsewhere on the internet, but are not recorded here. So, there are likely to be at least 2,000 Canadians who have posted their pledge to boycott Canadian Tire somewhere on the internet.
But lots of people don't use the internet, yet still would have taken the same pledge, but announced it through other means, such as a written letter to Canadian Tire, or even just telling their friends. There are likely about 10 times as many such people, which would mean roughly 20,000 Canadians who have written about or spoken about their pledge.
And let's not forget that we Canadians tend to be a polite group, who are more likely to keep our upset and alienation to ourselves. It would be well within the norm for a Canadian who is treated badly by an identifiable brand, to simply 'suck it up', and privately vow to never darken that retailer's door again, without making a public announcement. Typical numbers are between 10 and 25 'silent complaints' for each verbalized complaint. So, it is not unreasonable to assume that roughly 200,000 Canadians have already vowed to 'never buy from Canadian Tire again'.
And all this is based on the small sample of Canadians who have been identified in the last few months. The actual number keeps rising sharply, which bodes ill for this once-venerated retailer.
Could there be a million Canadians who boycott all Canadian Tire stores?
2 million? 3?
Sure, the Crappy People who post here might try to hide from these numbers, and dismiss this as 'only 200 people who didn't even bother to post on Canadian Tire Sucks Dot Net'.
But if they were at all interested in "strong customer service", they would surely be taking every single one of these boycott declarations very seriously.
And they will only hurt themselves and their employees if they continue to bury their collective heads in the sand.
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