People talk about brand management like it’s something a highly paid executive carefully orchestrates from the company’s headquarters. But more often, managing a brand is left to those at the front lines of contact, such as hourly workers, and sales people. Millions of dollars in advertisement cannot overcome a poorly trained or poorly chosen $10-dollar an hour employee, as I experienced this week while on vacation.A couple of days ago I went shopping at Silver Sands Outlet stores in Destin, Fl. I only visited two stores, and my experience with both could not have been any more different. First I went to the Guess store looking for a shirt. The store was not very busy, but soon a helpful sales lady opened a dressing room for me and brought me several shirts she thought were going to look good on me. Through the course of the conversation, she asked about my jeans preferrence and brought me 4 or 5 pairs to try on. Beth was great at her job. When something didn’t fit well, she immediately would say, “no, I don’t like that on you.” Soon, my single shirt purchase had grown into two shirts, a sweater and a pair of jeans.

I left the Guess store feeling good and ready to buy some news shoes to match my new purchases. I knew my next stop would have to be the Kenneth Cole store.

The store seemed empty of customers with all three sales people standing by the small counter in the middle of the store talking and bobbing their heads to some techno-lame song. No one seem to notice me, my large bag of purchases or the fact I was trying on several different pairs of shoes. As I matter of fact, when I asked one of the head-bobbing employee a question about their merchandise, I felt as if I were rudely interrupting their conversation; which I was.

I generally like Kenneth Cole’s shoes, but my experience with their store has tarnished their product in my mind. Whether those people were not trained well, or the store manager hired poorly, they entire Kenneth Cole brand suffered for it.

Think about your organization, your church, and the people you have at the front lines. Are they contributing to the brand promise you’re trying so hard to build, or are they working against you? Are the greeters at the parking lot creating that great first impression for your church, or are they yelling at the people for parking in the wrong stop, as someone did to me recently? (I wrote about it here) What about the person who answers your telephone? Have you thought of the tone of emails coming out of your organization? Sometimes people don’t realize how short or impatient they come across on their correspondence.

One thing is for sure: every touch matters. Every exchange defines your brand, beginning at the front lines.