We can borrow from our everyday business encounters and adapt and apply the care we receive to our personal relationships.  For example: waiters and waitresses who provide superior service receive more generous tips, and often not because of their efficiency, but for how they make us feel. 

If they fill our water glasses without being asked, we feel their care even if we didn’t notice it until we need a drink.  When they notice that we need an extra napkin, or a clean fork to replace the one we dropped on the floor but couldn’t reach under the table, we feel they are looking out for us. 

When they take our order in a timely way, especially when we are in a hurry, and then keep us informed of the kitchen’s progress, we know they are thinking about us.  We reward these and other caring actions even though they may lie outside of our conscious awareness. 

Waitresses improved their tips merely by being more personal, one study showed.   Customers rewarded them for smiling more often and for caring gestures such as lightly touching the customer’s shoulder or the back of their hand while taking an order, serving a dish, or asking if they can do anything else before walking away.

We don’t have to leave a tip under our plates at home, but whoever makes dinner or does the dishes deserves a kiss on the cheek, a pat on the butt, or some other outward show of appreciation.  Whatever we can do to show that we care about each other will bring meaning to our relationships and prevent the routine of the "business side of marriage" from numbing us down.

Every day I want Dennis to feel that marrying me was the best choice he ever made. To accomplish that, I have chosen to treat him the way we treated our best customers in our business. That means finding out what he’s thinking and feeling that day and what he needs to be happy. That sounds simple, but as all of us know, it’s challenging to find the time to focus on one another while accomplishing what we call the “business side of marriage” (the everyday chores and scheduling that eat up our time). I try to find a way every day to show him that he’s foremost in my mind and heart. Sometimes that’s bringing him a cup of coffee in his favorite cup while he’s getting ready for work. Sometimes I take out the garbage for him if he’s already in bed, and I know he just forgot. Maybe it’s planning a meal that he can eat in front of television to watch the “Sweet Sixteen” basketball games without interruption. Finding the “sweet spot” of our relationship every day brings a rhythm that makes our marriage hum.

Dennis has made the same commitment to me. Once he thought about our “Customer Metaphor”, he decided to concentrate on my needs and desires. He finds ways to make my life sweeter. Sometimes I find a flower on the seat of my car. Other times he’s written a little note and tucked it under the keyboard of my computer. He offers to run an errand for me if he sees I’m running out of time. These love taps keep the romance alive and make our marriage “sticky”.

We have all heard we have to work at marriage. Our book, Give Your Spouse the Best Customer Service Ever,  identifies ten skills that clarify ways to make your marriage work. We teach them to you, so you can find pleasure each day in being a partner to your true love. Do we deal with hardships and rough spots? Yes, it hasn’t been a smooth road all the time for us, and we share what we learned during those times that helped us be even more committed to one another.

Please join us and share your thoughts as we journey together to keep our marriages healthy, fun and enduring.

The list of reasons people give for why their marriages failed include the usual suspects: financial problems, infidelity, in-laws, disagreements about how to raise the kids, and so on. But none of these are the true reasons why marriages don’t stick. We believe that these problems are merely the symptoms of something more fundamental. Marriages fail for the same reason that businesses fail. They stop showing their customers that they care.

If that sounds simplistic, think back to when you started shopping at a new store or eating at a new restaurant. At the grand opening you were treated like a rich relative. Now recall when you started dating. You treated each other like royalty. You didn’t argue then about little things that bothered you. You were too busy showing each other how much you cared for each other’s pleasure and happiness. Even big problems didn’t seem insurmountable because you believed that your love could get you through anything.

The store or the restaurant that continues their royal treatment is likely to still be in business and doing well. How about the ones that took their customers for granted? It sounds like a chicken or egg problem. Do we stop caring because of problems, or do problems overwhelm us because we stop caring? We believe the latter, that problems engulf us because we have already stopped caring about each other. That isolates us and makes us feel alone. Together we could endure anything. Alone, the smallest troubles can feel too much to bear. The bumps that we were able to glide over in the beginning can loom like mountains ahead when we have no one to share the load.

The “Customer Metaphor” is a tool to remind us that caring doesn’t stop after marriage.

Imagine a sign on the front door of your favorite coffee shop or restaurant that announced, “Today we don’t care about you.” A business can’t succeed by taking a day off from treating its customers well. Neither can we stay in love by telling our partners that some days they don’t matter. Marriages fail because caring fails. By demonstrating “care” everyday we build a powerfully sticky bond, that embraces us, binds us together to face whatever problems come our way.