When the environment enables caring

We ate at Otto’s Cache in Jasper recently. The food was good — but the experience was exceptional. Everybody cared, and it showed. A fork slipped off the table and a replacement appeared within seconds. Someone was always checking in, always happy to help. Warm, attentive, welcoming. It was service at its best. The same week, we rented a car from Hertz. It hadn’t been cleaned — there was a cup holder filled with leaked orange juice. As I knew better than to ask for help cleaning the car, I asked the counter for a cleaning cloth and got pointed to the bathroom for tissues. A few days later, we realized that the previous renter had left their Kindle behind in the car. So we called Hertz with a simple ask: reach out to the person on file and let them know we had it. Ten minutes and one supervisor chat later, the answer was no. The employee agreed the request made sense. He just couldn’t act on it. The magic of Otto’s Cache wasn’t just about a manager setting a high bar. It was that they…