Experience is Everything for CXM Madeline Hayes

Maybe you land on our site for the first time and click link after link, casually browsing each new page, taking it all in, reading descriptions and reviews until you find just want you want.

Or maybe you’re an FDC veteran, so you get where you’re going within a click or two. You check out within minutes and go on about your life, daydreaming about your next cup of Fire Dept. Coffee.

Either way, it’s a great customer experience, and that’s what Madeline Hayes is here for.

Our Customer Experience Manager — CXM, for short — oversees the entire customer journey. From the moment a coffee drinker first hears about our brand through their first purchase and far beyond, we want to make it all memorable. We want you to feel valued and connected to our brand, so we think through all the little details.

“It’s my job to make sure every customer has a positive, smooth experience that leaves them feeling happy and satisfied,” Madeline said. “ A lot of it  involves working with new developments on the website, identifying any customer pain points and fixing them, and finding ways to improve the overall experience for customers.”

The Right Fit at the Right Time

Graduating from college amid the outbreak of a global pandemic might not seem like the best time to enter the job market, but Madeline got lucky. And so did we. 

One of her professors at Columbia College Chicago had worked with Fire Dept. Coffee on charity fundraisers and knew that we were hiring in our customer service department. She helped make the connection, and Madeline joined our team in June 2020. 

Her growth in the company has been steady and smooth. Shortly after arriving, she took over a new role as Community Manager, overseeing the customer service team and the FDC community. A year later, we challenged her to become our CXM and fine tune our customer experience.

“I really love working with a team that is passionate about what they do,” she said. “I love helping people which is why I went into the field of Customer Experience, but getting to help ill and injured firefighters while I’m at it just makes me feel even more passionate about what I do. I’m grateful for a team that has faith in me and truly values my opinions.”

When she’s not at work, she’s spending time with her fiance, Scotty, and their cats, Olive and Dabi. Or she’s spending time with her parents and siblings, playing a Dungeons & Dragons campaign, or pursuing one of her many hobbies, which range from embroidery to swing dancing. 

Madeline likes to live outside of her comfort zone, and we like to think it helps her think about our customers from every possible angle.

The Little Things That Make a Big Difference

At Fire Dept. Coffee, every customer is important. And our coffee subscription customers are the real heart of what we do here.

That’s why Madeline said she took special pride in spearheading the redesign of our online subscription portal last year. The goal of the project was to make it easier for customers to manage their subscription on their own — whether that meant swapping coffee preferences, skipping a delivery or adding to their order. 

So Madeline and her team went through the website, identifying anything that might slow down or prevent that process. Then they crafted a plan to remove any obstacle standing in the way.

Now our subscription portal is easy and effortless. Of course, customers don’t realize the effort it took to get it that way, and that’s the goal.

“It was awesome to see how my work directly affected the ability for customers to manage their subscription on their own,” Madeline said.