Gadling

It sounds counterintuitive, right? Normally, customers expect that extra effort, and we complain constantly that we don't get it enough. What we sometimes don't understand, though, is that the extra effort is at the root of many of the customer service problems we encounter. Going the extra mile at the wrong time can be a disaster.

I remember a case presented at a conference I attended back in 1999 (yeah, it made an impression), when I was a consultant in the hotel industry. Some customer service guru was teaching us how to better serve our clients – which was pretty important, since our clients, the hotels, were in the service business. She discussed with us a bank teller who spent extra time with a customer – going that extra mile" – even though there was a long line waiting. The guru couldn't summon enough praise for this teller. Even though everybody else was waiting, this teller put forth more than was necessary to make a customer happy.

Almost as soon as the story was over, people in different parts of the audience barked almost in unison, "What about everyone else?" The service aficionado spent several minutes ducking and dodging as a growing number of attendees hurled the lines of "I'd be pissed," "That's not good service!" and "Do you really believe that stuff?" She eventually recovered and finished her session, but the discussion at the bar that night was all about whether to please the one at the expense of the many.

Step aside, Australia: travelers now prefer the United States. A report by consulting firm FutureBrand shows that the United States' Country Brand Index topped Australia, which usually has the top spot. The survey collects the thoughts of around 3,000 international business and recreational travelers, measuring how various countries are perceived. The report credits President Obama with driving the increase, since a decent dose of anti-American sentiment around the world put some pressure on the countries performance in the rankings.

The United States ranks best as "ideal for business," but it lags in many of the 29 other categories. Japan and the United Kingdom score higher for nightlife, and Singapore beats the United States as a shopping destination.

Even with the high score, the Department of Commerce expects visits from abroad to fall 8 percent this year, thanks to an awful global economy.

Interested in seeing the whole top 10 list? Check for it after the jump.

All it takes is a short video and a good reason ... and you could win a trip to Orlando. A new contest sponsored by the Orlando/Orange County Convention & Visitors Bureau, the Florida Film Festival and an organization called KIDS FIRST! Will send a family of four to Orlando for three nights, with accommodations, airfare and rental car access included. Theme park tickets will also be available, but the filmmaker passes to the Florida Film Festival (which runs from April 8 – 19) is the real prize. I went last year and had a blast.

To win, a kid age 13 – 18 needs to answer a simple question: Why does Orlando make you smile? The answers, which must be by video, can either be animated or in live action and can't exceed three minutes. The winners will be announced in late February, and their films will be premiered at the film festival.

If you were to steal 1,000 pieces of luggage, where would you keep it all? Wherever they shoved the bags, Keith Wilson King and Stacy Lynne Legg-King saw the police pull them out of their house one-by-one and stack them in the yard. The duo had been pinching luggage from the baggage carousels at the Phoenix airport, amassing an impressive collection of stolen goods ... so big the police couldn't provide an exact number.

Phoenix Detective James Holiday called what the Kings did "a livelihood," rather than the pieces of luggage picked up a bit at a time or only as a one-shot deal.

Keith King was originally arrested three weeks ago for misdemeanor theft. The police kept an eye on him, though. When he went back to the airport again, the police followed him home (on Monday). The next day, they searched the King home and found many, many more. Both King and his wife were arrested, with the latter also picked up on charges of tampering with evidence.

The moral of the story? Be careful what you check!

[Photo by sun dazed via Flickr]

Ryanair may start to look for its planes closer to home. Of course, saying it was thinking about a switch from Boeing to Airbus would be far too simple for CEO Michael O'Leary ... the genius behind "pay-to-pee" and many, many other stunts. O'Leary needs a bit more style, which is why his new intentions are being called "divorce."

O'Leary believes that the management shakeup at Boeing has taken the company's eye off the ball, which could be enough to make him switch teams. According to the Wall Street Journal, Ryanair is one of Boeing's largest clients and has been working an order for as many as 200 planes ... but the negotiations have been going on for more than a year. O'Leary says, "The difficulty has just been in getting someone in Boeing to make a decision. Boeing seem to have a degree of internal turmoil."

But, O'Leary has pulled this game before, and according to WSJ's The Source blog, he "is known to speak in the heat of the moment, use colorful language at press conferences to the amusement of journalists, and shoot from the hip." Yeah, like the time he referred to the idiots in the "blogsphere ..."

Want to thin out O'Leary's wallet? Check out the video below for a few ideas.

The network for wanderers seems to be doing a bit of that itself these days. Cox Communications, which owns the Travel Channel, is shopping it around, with several companies expressing interest. So, will it wind up with Scripps Networks, which has the Food Network and HGTV? Or, could it wind up part of Rupert Murdoch's empire over at News Corp?

So far, Scripps seems to be in the lead, with Rupert's folks not crazy about the climbing price of the channel. The latest bids, word is, are north of $1 billion. Back in June, when Cox first put it on the block, industry watchers figured it would fetch between $600 million and $700 million. Last week, the $900 million mark was pierced and has since been left in the rearview mirror.

The Travel Channel hasn't landed yet, and it could take a while for the dust to settle. We'll keep watching ... the action, that is.

Visitors from outside the United States came in and spent $9.9 billion in August ... which sounds like a lot. Unfortunately, it's down 21 percent from what they spent in August 2008, according to the U.S. Department of Commerce, as the travel slump continues to clamp wallets shut. The good news, though, is that spending by foreign visitors to the United States edged 1 percent higher from July.

Spending by visitors to the United States has fallen every month since 2008, but the really severe declines began in May. Year-over-year drops have been 20 percent or worse every month since then: -23 percent in May, -22 percent in June and July and -21 percent in August.

Most of the money came from "travel receipts," which the Commerce Department defines as just about everything except the planes, trains, boats and so on that take travelers into and out of the country. This was good for $7.8 billion in August and includes food, lodging, gives and entertainment, among other categories. "Passenger fare receipts," the travel money, brought $2.1 billion into the U.S. economy in August -- off $700 million from the previous August.

So far this year, foreign visitors have poured $79.4 billion into the U.S. travel and tourism industry, which is $16.4 billion less than we saw at this point in 2008 (a decline of 17 percent).

Pamela Root, who was kicked off a Southwest Airlines flight Friday, will receive another chance to fly on the airline. She and her son were removed from a San Jose-bound plane when her two-year-old son wouldn't stop screaming "Go! Plane! Go!" and "I want Daddy!"

In addition to an apology, the airline gave her a refund and a travel voucher for $300. Root had hoped to be compensated for the portable crib and diapers she said she had to buy, but alas, that wasn't in the cards.

I have to admit, this seems like a tough call. While it's never easy to boot a paying passenger, you need to balance that against the eardrums of everyone else who shelled out for a ticket. Of course, a bit of compassion for kids (who don't know any better) is necessary, but that's little consolation to everyone else.

It looks to me like Southwest made the right call in both parts of this. It removed what was obviously a problem for the other passengers, and it more than compensated Root for the trouble. Southwest is out a few extra bucks for the decision, but that seems to be a small price to pay for the goodwill it earned with the remaining fliers. And, it swiftly apologized and compensated the mom.

Coeur d'Alene, Idaho may not be the first destination that comes to mind for holiday travel. I mean ... who jumps to Idaho?! Well, this is a problem that needs to be remedied. If you're looking to take off for a few days between Thanksgiving and New Year's Day, there's a lot happening in Coeur d'Alene.

1. Holiday Light Show: More than 1.5 million lights are hung along the Coeur d'Alene waterfront every winter, creating the largest on-the-water holiday light show in the United States. The festivities kick off the day after Thanksgiving with a parade through downtown with more than 5,000 candles. One button is clicked at the end, bringing the waterfront to life with white lights, a 30-foot wreath and a fireworks display. This event runs through the end of the holiday season.

2. Fantasy Cruise to the North Pole: Cross the water by boat to visit the workshop run by the esteemed Santa and Mrs. Claus. On display, you'll find a 161-foot Christmas tree with north of 30,000 sparkling LED and colored lights. The lights themselves take on the shapes of nearly 150 characters, from fire-breathing dragons to dancing elves to giant snowflakes. You can take advantage of this from the day after Thanksgiving until New Year's Day. Set sail at the Coeur d'Alene Resort.

I haven't been to southern California in a while, but it looks like I just got a reason to go back. A Legoland hotel is in the works at the theme park of the same name in Carlsbad, California. The city council approved the move this week. When construction is finished, a serpentine-shaped hotel will have 254 rooms, sit right next to the theme park and put Lego-loving nerds like me in the middle of an environment we've always fantasized about.

The basic rooms will have Legos printed on wallpaper and the carpets ... along with instructions on how to build different Lego creations. The top-end rooms, however, will take the fanaticism to a new level: you'll be able to live the Pirate Shores attraction in an appropriately themed room.

Unfortunately, an opening date hasn't been announced yet, so we have to wait. This may be easier for the hotel's target demographic – kids between two and 12 years old – than it will be for those of us who grew up with Legos and are eager to relive a creative part of our youths. Construction is said to be deferred until the market improves, after which it should take a year and a half to complete.

[Photo by joedecruyenaere via Flickr]