This week the Hong Kong Tourism Board relaunched a 2002 campaign starring actor Andy Lau Tak-wa in response to growing criticism of the city's service levels. New Ad SeriesLouis Koo Tin-lok is one of the actors who has taken up the role, urging Hong Kong service staff to “go the extra mile”.
I feel sorry for the Hong Kong Tourism Board, which has the difficult task of restoring the city's appeal as a tourist destination. Changing consumption habits Tourists from the mainland make up the majority of tourists in the city, Increasing competition I don't envy the position tourism officials are in, having to increase Hong Kong's attractiveness to tourists when everything seems to be weighing on the city compared to other major Asian tourist hubs.
But convening a bunch of flawless celebrities to berate frontline service staff, or urging waiters, salespeople and taxi drivers to try a little harder, is not the right answer. A recent survey by the Hong Kong Association of Small and Medium Enterprises found that 70% of local small businesses Small and medium-sized enterprises It reported a decline in performance compared to pre-pandemic levels.
Hong Kong's food and beverage industry remains suffer from a shortage of staff Overall, that means that the people who are currently clearing tables will have to serve many more people. In fact, I would love to know if any of the celebrities on the ad call sheets have ever worked in the service industry. If so, they probably wouldn't have taken this job.
The reality is that the service industry generally is, and always has been, a tough business providing a service to people. Shortage of manpower A tough economy is making life tougher than ever for the city's often-overlooked blue-collar workers.
This is no excuse for rude behavior, but the spectacle of highly paid actors expecting lower-paid servers in the restaurant, retail and taxi industries to raise standards is a grotesque sight.
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The biggest irony is that by relaunching the campaign, the tourist board has inadvertently proven what most locals already know: except perhaps in ultra-fine restaurants, service levels are generally Always below par In Hong Kong.
Twenty years after Lau made “this kind of service spirit is not enough” a catchphrase popular in a government-sponsored campaign, Hong Kong remains City of SmilesIn fact, just as being shoved off the sidewalk by someone defiantly saying, “This is where you walk!” is a mark of your arrival in New York, having your plate snatched from under you as you take your last bite is a rite of passage in Hong Kong.
Again, this is not to condone the unprofessional behavior of some professionals. Resolving Dissatisfaction People who discriminate against customers, or against where they come from or what language they speak, live in Hong Kong. But if Hong Kong is still the place where most tourists go, Its gritty charmits rough-around-the-edges people are part of the package.
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Instead of pinning our hopes on minimum wage workers, what if stars put on a dirty apron for a day and empathized with the realities of frontline restaurant work? False advertising on the rise With celebrities acting out fake scripts, what if tourism boards worked with Khoo and his next generation of creatives to expose the realities of these high-pressure jobs and help foster a culture of mutual respect among customers, staff and tourists alike?
There is a quote that has been widely misinterpreted as saying by the deceased. Anthony Bourdain But it's still a fitting quote: “Anyone who's worked in a restaurant knows it right away: There's a level of empathy that only someone who's stood between a hungry person and a $28 pork chop can develop, a special understanding of how a motley crew of misfits can become a family.”
Imagine what would have happened if you had told Bourdain that service standards should not end at “good enough” — you probably would have been kicked out of his restaurant, too.
Annika Park is a senior strategist at TBWA Hong Kong.
