L.L. Bean used to be known as the world’s largest cataloguer in the outdoor specialty field, back when catalogs were a popular way to buy something. This year, L.L. Bean’s Internet sales will exceed its catalog orders for the first time. The transition has been disruptive for the company, but it hasn’t diminished its customer focus.

In 1994, I featured L.L. Bean in a chapter on determining customer requirements in my book, Total Quality Management. It hasn’t lost a step. BusinessWeek ranked it #1 on its list of Customer Service Champs (March 1, 2010), citing its loyal followers, liberal return policy, and folksy sales staff.

BusinessWeek uses J.D. Power & Associates data on the perceived quality of a company’s staff and what customers think of its processes, supplemented by surveying 5,000 people and asking them to nominate three companies they felt were the best at customer service and three they thought were the worst. You can read about the whole methodology by clicking on the link to the article above.

Here, then, are the 2010 Customer Service Champs:

1. L.L. Bean
2. USAA
3. Apple
4. Four Seasons Hotels & Resorts
5. Publix Super Markets
6. Nordstrom
7. Lexus
8. Ritz-Carlton
9. Barnes & Noble
10. Ace Hardware
11. Amazon.com
12. Wegmans Food Markets
13. Starbucks
14. Amica Mutual Insurance
15. Charles Schwab
16. Jaguar
17. WestJet
18. American Express
19. Enterprise Rent-a-Car
20. Branch Banking & Trust
21. Panera Bread
22. True Value
23. Dell
24. Southwest Airlines
25. Fairmont Hotels & Resorts

To read about how your organization can become a customer service champ, click on these articles:

• KEYSTONE: Customer Knowledge
• 9 Ways to Get Closer to Customers
• Ground Zero for Customer Service
• Dangerous Assumptions about Customers
• Lessons Learned from Dell Hell
• Bottom-Line Value of Customer Engagement

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