Service Quality Issue: Lavasa City: Perfected Looks, wanting experience!!

Yesterday, I had a chance to visit Lavasa City..! Wonnnnderrfully landscaped, it was giving the exact effect of walking in London city, like near Victoria Station to Terminus, or a hundred other paths. The evening sunlight shining directly on the picture-postcard perfect buildings was also looking European! The buildings on the waterfront have been constructed huddling together exactly in the European style, and the signature spire on top of a building and the two towers along with the cobblestones complete the effect, to such a high degree of accuracy, that I was finding it difficult to believe that I was not in London (or some similar European city)..! I mean I am not an architectural freak, so probably I wouldn't be able to argue with someone who can point-out that "European spires are built on octagonal towers whereas British ones have hexagonal ones" so I won't fight. Neither is the average pedestrian an architectural freak! So, apart from a few architectural puritans, most will agree that the effect created on the wharf (or similar) on the waterfront on the Lavasa city is absolutely 100% Londonish!
So, in this pseudo-London, with a bunch of hungry kids, at around 3:00 PM, I walked into an impeccable joint with a concocted English name, which sold pizzas and burgers. Now my expectations had been set for the kind of service which goes in with these kinds of places. Alas, the service there was pathetic...! The restaurant owners simply had rounded some of the frailest gents, (who naturally were unfit for the hard-labour which goes in there) dressed them up in some uniform and started calling them waiters!
Believe me, being a waiter is one of the most demanding jobs in the world, and a waiter at these high-end restaurants simply requires highest competence...! These poor souls had difficulty in reading the Menu items. So, I pointed out the items on the Menu by place to avoid mistakes. Even then they managed to jumble up the Mexican with the Italian and sandwiches with similarly named burgers..! Also, the lead time in a supposedly fast-food joint was more than 30-40 minutes!!! Kids were practically howling by that time, so nobody wasted time in analyzing what s/he had ordered vs what they got!! Whatever came on the table was immediately cut up in four portions, and each kid devoured one..! By the time, it came to me and 'the boss' downing a few morsels, we had covered half the menu, run up a huge bill, and nobody was satisfied. Not only that, the waiters had no idea about paper-napkins, and other niceties (which become ESSENTIALS in such fine dining joints).
I realized the importance of Service Maturity once again..! Why is it that we pay so scant attention to the Quality of Service? Just because it is intangible? We are willing to spend billions of rupees into pouring the concrete, but hardly any into making sure that it gives the correct experience..! After all, when visitors come here, they are not going to carry home the buildings! They will take the EXPERIENCE home! (ok, maybe a few snaps too!) Compared to what has been spent in getting the cement and the rocks in place, we will have to spend a miniscule amount to get the EXPERIENCE right. But we don't! Because, Service Maturity is soooo completely intangible to us..!
The same experience was repeated at the Baskin Robins outlet. The guy there was so rude and uncouth that it was impossible to relate that to the normal Baskin Robins experience in India, let alone the service experience one would expect on the streets of London!
If the Lavasa City Administration spends a few thousands on exploring their service management criteria to ensure that everyone gets a complete European experience, that would be money well spent..! Otherwise, we will end up creating a perfect shell with perfect looks, but it will fail to give the perfect experience. Looking at the grandeur of the effort and its potential to become a landmark in India, it would be a crime not to invest in service management!!!
If we are making an egg, we have to understand what's inside. Otherwise, we will end up making somethign which looks like an egg, but cannot be used to make an omlette!
In Lavasa City, I believe that we are trying to create the perfect EXPERIENCE. After creating the platforms on which the experience is to happen, let us work on the experience too!!!
Cheers!