Steam.
Yup, Valve is still in it for the money of course, but the customer really does come first. I’ve used their support a few times and they’ve always been stellar. I will always buy Valve products.
Yeah, shoulda said Valve, rather than Steam.
I do like Valve and their products, but I can’t ignore that they know they have an underage gambling issue and have done nothing to fix it.
Here’s a coffeezilla video about it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13eiDhuvM6Y
You mean the company that makes money from getting children addicted to gambling?
Costco, Bosch
When I go into a Costco, I take a minute to look at the board showing the pictures names of long-time employees. At my local one, they have about 15 people who have been working there for over 30 years.
Met a woman who had been a Costco employee for 25 years. In addition to everything else, she got 6 weeks of paid holidays a year. How many other retail employers come anywhere close to that?
she got 6 weeks of paid holidays a year. How many other retail employers come anywhere close to that?
Every single one, in about half the countries on earth.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_minimum_annual_leave_by_country
Agreed with Costco… and used to agree with Bosch… until seeing this recent video.
The only quality Bosch product I’ve used is windscreen wipers. Every other tool or appliance has been pretty average in terms of quality.
Arizona Iced Tea
Dudes a multi-billionaire and doesn’t understand how someone could want more.
That’s why he puts the MSRP on the cans even tho he can’t control store prices. Most stores still sell it at 99c, because they’re still making profit on it.
He could sell them for 2x and barely lose any sales, but why?
I heard this story before and it is truly amazing how the CEO still stands behinds his principles and values.
It would be a lot more common if we had anti-monopoly laws still.
There used to be a shit ton of regional stuff like this where one family owned everything, and 10 million a year was good enough instead of needing x% growth forever.
If you’re not cutting every corner to make the quarterly % increase constantly go up, workers aren’t getting fucked over as much, at least not every time. So everyone losses when we have mega corps. And that’s the natural result of unregulated capitalism
Dean’s Beans coffee. The owner was an amazing guy, fair trade, all that. When he stepped down, he handed ownership to the employees.
Chewy dog food will send you flowers and a refund if you pet died.
I called their customer support, and a person answered. Like, right away. I was caught completely off guard. They resolved my issue in under a minute.
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Still applies
Saddleback Leather springs to mind. Their stuff is expensive but they have a 100 year warranty and their tag line is “They’ll fight over it when you’re dead”. I have a couple of their bags, belts, and wallets. I don’t expect to ever need to replace them.
First thing I bought from them was a briefcase back in 2011. About three years after I bought it one of the steel D-Rings for the strap failed and they paid courier fees for me to return the briefcase from the UK, replaced the part, cleaned the bag up, and sent it back, no questions asked.
Full disclosure: 1) they’re an American company which might put some off buying in the current climate and 2) the founder is a devout Christian which might put others off but none of their products have ever tried to make me a believer so I’m ok with it.
Mailbox.org They could go all the way and become “cool and cloud” but decided not to.
Haix While their customer service is not what it used to be they are still more than decent to a point it hurts their sales.
With my last one I am not 100% convinced: Mikrotik. While their stuff I great and cheap for what it does, I also had one really lacking support experience with them (they forgot to pack the rack ears for a switch and neither the vendor nor they could somehow get me ones. Another premium partner of them helped me for free and since then will always get my business). But in total they are still the good guys I think.
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My second cousin’s boyfriend worked for them doing overnight shipping. Loved the company so much, he started working at the main branch in Mexico. Left in the middle of the night though. Also left his kid and girlfriend. The owner was really cool though. Felt so bad he gave her $15k for the trouble.
Patagonia is solid. Osprey (packs) recently sold to a conglomerate but I have an old pack I can send in soon to test their “we will repair it no matter what” guarantee.
I love Patagonia. They’ll repair anything even if you’re not the original owner., they use sustainable and recycled materials and they’ve used their profits to protect huge areas of land.
Too bad they are so expensive though. Out of my budget.
Buy stuff on sale or used, then take it to the Patagonia store to get repaired. Great for things like jeans, they’ll last a lifetime.
Arizona iced tea is still 99 cents.
Probably a very niche answer, but Korbel winery in California has gone above and beyond to help me out on several occasions, and real people actually answer the phone when you call customer service. I don’t know anything about their owner or politics, but I’ve had nothing but outstanding experiences with them.
In France, we have this : https://cestquilepatron.com/
The concept is that customers are asked questions to make a new product that satisfies them. For example, they want to sell apples. They will ask in what country they should buy them, how well the farmer should be paid, what size… and you see in real time how it affects the price. Then, the product will be sold in supermarkets at that price
There is also mutual insurance https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutual_insurance
Where can you buy these products in France?
In grocery stores
Is it in larger supermarkets like Intermarché/Leclerc? I’ll look for it next time I’m over there
Yes
You can see it at carrefour, monoprix, leclerc, intermarché…
Il look for that. Ty!
Seems like these guys: https://nubo.coop/en/
They provide email, calendar, contacts, and cloud storage.
On their mission statement page they explicitly have:
not seeking to enrich shareholders
LEGO comes to mind. Not cheap, but definitely knows how to keep a healthy and active relationship with their customers.
I loved them as a kid and just bought a 3 in 1 kit for my Granddaughters Easter basket. She is nutty balls over Legos. That company has secured multi-generational love.
If you do the math as time has gone on the average set has gotten far more complex and used more pieces. If you look at the prices from a the perspective of price per individual Lego piece I am pretty sure they have pretty much stayed the same price the entire time. I watched a YouTube video essay about it like a year ago so it’s probably still true today.
Inherently all brands care about profit as they need money to function but I get what you mean.
I’m generally not one for brand loyalty but if you need a motorcycle you really can’t go wrong with any Yamaha and if you need a knife Benchmade has been unbelievably good to me even when I send it ones with snapped off tips years after purchase to get repaired/replaced.
Inherently all brands
All publicly traded brands…
Believe it or not even private ones still need to to make money to keep working. Granted they aren’t trying to also make extra money to keep investors happy.
All brands and businesses are trying to make money. The question is are they also trying to buy a third yatch or are they just happy with being able to give all their employees a good raise and Christmas bonus every year.
All brands and businesses are trying to make money
But only publicly traded ones will trade the brand recognition they’ve built for short term profits…
Investors care about quarterly growth, which literally cannot keep constantly increasing.
A private company could have a flat dollar goal for yearly profit. And not give a shit if that number goes up 100k a year at the detriment to long term profits
I thought that didn’t need explaining, but I can admit when I’m wrong.
