No company is going to do well or even be a company for long with a track record of poor customer service. In this highly competitive business world, there’s very little room for shoddy treatment of the people who support the bottom line in a big-time way.

At Tucker Paving, Inc., in Winter Haven, we know construction best and we’ve learned how competitive this industry can be — how competitive it is — right here alone in our own big backyard of Central Florida. We also think we’ve learned a few key things about good customer service and how to provide it. Nearly 22 years in business (with steady growth along the way) is a good indicator of that. Essentially, quality customer service is a combination of consistent small extra services, devotions to detail, common courtesies, and applications of the business Golden Rule — the “stuff” that keeps existing customers coming back to you with their projects and gets potential new customers to take notice of a good reputation and check you out.

Occasionally on our Facebook page — www.facebook.com/tuckerpaving — we’ll post interesting quotes from notable leaders and motivational speakers about superior business ethics, work quality, and customer service. In keeping with the theme of this article, here’s a baker’s dozen worth of brief quotes we like about customer service. Maybe you’ll like them, too.

1. “Every great business is built on friendship.” — James Cash Penney, Jr., founder of the JCPenney department stores company

2. “The customer’s perception is your reality.” — Kate Zabriskie, author of Customer Service Excellence: How to Deliver Value to Today’s Busy Customer

3. “Make a customer, not a sale.” — Katherine Barchetti, founder of K. Barchetti Shops, an upscale retailing company in Pittsburgh

4. “Here is a simple but powerful rule: Always give people more than what they expect to get.” — Nelson Boswell, author of Inner Peace, Inner Power

5. “Customer service is just a day-in, day-out, ongoing, never-ending, unremitting, persevering, compassionate type of activity.” — Leon Gorman, the late L.L. Bean president and chairman of the board

6. “Your customers are responsible for your company’s reason for existing.” — Marilyn Suttle, president of Suttle Enterprises, LLC, a personal and professional growth-training firm

7. “There are no traffic jams along the extra mile.” — Roger Staubach, Super Bowl-winning quarterback (Dallas Cowboys) and member of the Pro Football Hall of Fame

8. “Customers don’t expect you to be perfect. They do expect you to fix things when they go wrong.” — Donald Porter, vice president of British Airways

9. “People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.” — Theodore Roosevelt, 26th president of the United States

10. “Make it easy for your customers to do talk to you.” — Kevin Stirtz, author of More Loyal Customers: 21 Real World Lessons to Keep Your Customers Coming Back

11. “Either you follow up or you fold up.” — Bernard Kelvin Clive, personal branding coach and Amazon best-selling author

12. “He profits most who serves best.” — Arthur F. Sheldon, co-founder of the Institute of Economic Affairs in London

13. “Good service is good business.” — Seibel advertisement