Dear Valued Offspring,
Thank you for choosing us to raise you. Or if you did not exactly choose us, for bearing with us. Your continued business has meant a great deal to our organization these last 18 years.
And congratulations on reaching this next phase where you are well on your way to becoming a one-hundred-percent long-distance customer! We look forward to building our relationship with you in the future.
But since you are moving on, we would appreciate your responding to a few questions about your experience thus far. Although at this point they might not benefit you that much, your answers will enable us to fine-tune our brand for your younger siblings.
1. How would you rate the attitude of our management team? Overall did they seem motivated and alert? When warranted, were they able to meet with you one-on-one and to answer questions? Don’t forget that we are a total service provider and have always operated on a limited budget, not to mention being seriously understaffed. So we could not be everywhere at once, and that is why we were fortunate to have so many different ways of contacting you remotely. We are honestly not sure what we would have done without these, and we are excited about becoming even more reliant on them when you are not here at all.
Speaking of which, please Venmo Mom the money you owe her for last week’s splurge on the Amazon account. Do you really need an “antimicrobial pop-up hibernation bed-tent” for college? What on earth for? We know that dorms have changed since our own college years, but we can’t believe they have changed that much.
2. How would you rate the food? Keep in mind that this could only be prepared in real-time and that, hard as it may be to believe, neither of our chefs went to the Culinary Institute or apprenticed under a master-chef in Tuscany. Most of their training happened on the job, where they did their best to offer a bold, original take on traditional recipes. They are especially proud of “meatloaf extraordinaire,” a concoction like no others as customers often point out.
3. How would you rate the activities? Did they have a clear objective or was this somewhat hard to figure out? Please evaluate only those activities in which our management team had a direct involvement. A customer who longboarded into a parked car while out with his friends was acting on his own. We cannot be held responsible.
We should also mention that our organization remains committed to “yardwork Sunday,” despite its unpopularity. After much Skyping back and forth, our consensus is that some participation in the upkeep of facilities is good for customers. So we will continue to send out weekly Evites to this event, which we do not of course expect you to attend next year. But we want to be sure you know you are invited.
4. What was your favorite part of your upbringing? Here the more specific you can be the better. Saying that it was the “long car trips where we spent so much time together listening to our separate playlists” or “all Dad’s corny tweets” is not as helpful as telling us which ones had the most impact. If it was the six-hour trip to Philadelphia, we agree that for some of us the music of Kenny Loggins really held up.
If it was Dad’s joke about who lived at the Gettysburg address, we are not so sure. We are of the opinion that his series of tweets on bovine gastrointestinal disorders represents Dad’s best work.
5. Would you recommend us to a friend? Not that we are looking to expand our customer base right now. Still, we would be curious to know. And having brought up this topic, we have now given you more incentive to check our Facebook posts when you are away.
Actually, that last was one of Dad’s jokes. You do not have to be anxious about reading our posts. We really have no plans to take on additional customers. An announcement of that kind is not going to show up in your news feed. It is only through you and your siblings that we are looking to “grow” our business.
And now that you are all grown, we would like to thank you for taking time from your summer packing, which we hope that you have in fact started, to fill out this survey. Please return it at your earliest convenience to Mom at her work email, and if you have any questions or concerns, don’t hesitate to reach out to either of us to schedule a face-to-face meeting.