Where I Learned Hospitality

 

Long before anyone called it "customer experience" or wrote books about servant leadership, I learned hospitality behind the counter of a small, family-owned auto parts store in the early 1970s.

My dad didn't set out to own a retail business. He was an auto parts salesman, calling on stores and suppliers throughout the region. But somewhere along the way, someone pointed him to a little parts store in Corpus Christi that was for sale. One conversation led to another, and before he fully realized it, my dad wasn't just selling parts anymore — he was the owner and operator. That store became my classroom.

I spent countless hours there after school and on weekends. While other kids were riding bikes or watching TV, I was behind the counter taking apart carburetors, alternators, and starters — just to see if I could put them back together. I learned how things worked by getting my hands dirty, and I learned how people worked by watching my dad.

Over the years, nearly everyone behind that counter shared my last name. Mom kept the books. My sister helped her. My brother-in-law and brother worked inside sales. I started on the delivery truck and eventually worked my way up to inside sales manager. We weren't just family — we were the workforce. The sign on the door didn't say "family owned and operated," but it didn't need to. It was obvious to everyone who walked in.

Everything in that store was manual — no computers, no scanners, no software. Just a cash register that rang loud enough to hear across the store, a calculator, handwritten invoices, and inventory cards filed neatly in drawers. Simple. Honest. And it worked.

Our mornings had a ritual. We'd arrive early, count out the cash drawer, make the coffee, stock the counter with fresh invoices and pens. The other employees arrived fifteen minutes before opening to make sure everything was clean and ready. No one wandered in late. No one stood around waiting to be told what to do. The tone had already been set — and it was set by my dad.

The days were steady: greeting walk-ins, answering phones, restocking shelves, covering each other at lunch so customers never had to wait. My dad spent hours at the inventory desk, but just as often he was right there at the front counter — talking to customers, answering questions, and watching closely how we treated people.

And that's where the unspoken rule lived — the one that shaped everything:

Every customer was greeted the moment they walked in. Every customer was thanked when they left.

No exceptions. If you missed a greeting, you heard about it. Not harshly — but clearly. Hospitality wasn't optional, it wasn't situational, and it wasn't dependent on someone's mood, their appearance, or the size of their purchase. It was simply how we did business. Every single day.

Looking back, my dad was teaching us what leadership experts still talk about today: great culture is modeled before it's managed. It starts at the top and works its way into every interaction, every greeting, every thank you at the door. Hospitality isn't accidental — it's taught, practiced, and reinforced until it becomes second nature.

That little auto parts store is where I learned that hospitality has nothing to do with being fancy or scripted. It's about seeing people — really seeing them — acknowledging them, and treating them with genuine respect from the moment they walk through your door.

More than fifty years later, those lessons are still with me.

And I'm convinced they always will be. 

Join me in interrupting the world by starting with the space you occupy, wherever you are.