1) I had bought a couple bottles of Madhava Agave nectar. My sister noticed that her bottle, which was unopened had some black floaties, and mine, which had been opened, had it too. I emailed the company to see if maybe that was normal. They emailed me back within a half hour with an explanation of what had happened to that batch and FedEx’ed me 2 new bottles.

2) Feld Inc. (the company that does Ringling Brothers circus). We had gone to the circus and bought a light up wand for our daughter. A few days later, it was broken. I remembered the lady that sold it telling us about a 2 year warranty. I didn’t know what that warranty covered, but figured it didn’t hurt to send an email. They sent us out a brand new wand wihtin a few days!

When I went to the check-out counter to pay for my goods, I asked the cashier if there were any current coupons available to apply towards my purchase (this was not a grocery store). She pointed to the one on the counter and said, “I’m sorry, but this one is only good after the holidays.” I smiled and said, “Oh, that’s okay; no biggie.” Then we continued to make small-talk and at the end of my transaction as I took my bag from her hands she said, “I gave you my employee discount–30 percent!” Wow!

Eureka rocks! I bought a Eureka Smart Vac (based on Consumer Reports ratings) 5 years ago and since that time, I have had to replace the pedal and hose one time. Needing another pedal and hose, I wrote the customer service a very nice email explaining my situation and they sent me both parts for free; no shipping costs either.

Another thing to remember is to provide them with as much information as possible. If it’s a food product, give them the information off the bag or box. This would include expiration dates and any information contained on the line with the expiration date. If it has a USDA seal on it, somewhere on the package would be an Establishment code which would help them narrow the production down to a specific manufacturing location. Also helpful, is the location where you purchased your product.

My best story is Hasbro. My 5 year old worked so hard to save up his own money to buy the Transformer Superion. It was a limited edition toy that cost about $30 and was only available at Target. He finally had enough and we found one of the last ones available around here. He had had it for less than 24 hours and one of the plastic joints broke, so it couldn’t be transformed anymore and he was heart-broken. My first reaction was, “Transformers are junk. I don’t care how much he likes them we won’t be buying any more.” But my husband called Hasbro. They were extremely apologetic and said that it breaking was unacceptable. Since we were unable to find a replacement (Target had sold out), they sent us a postage label to return the entire thing. We mailed it off and within a couple of weeks we had a check for $36 (which more than covered what he’d paid). And because it was such a positive experience, I had no problem letting him use his money to buy another Transformer, which happens to be made much better than the last one.