“Happy employees make (for) happy customers” is a popular adage in the hospitality industry (such as hotels and restaurants). J. Willard Marriott, founder of the Marriott hotel chain, developed the motto, “Take good care of the associates and they’ll take good care of the customers and they’ll return again and again.”
 
“Happy employees make happy customers” has been cited since at least 1951 and 1962.
 
 
3 August 1927, Oregonian (Portland, OR), pg. 8, col. 2:
The Enke Plant operates on the theory that happy employees make for efficient service, and with this in mind, the new building has been equipped with every provision for the comfort and safety of employees.
     
17 May 1951, Evening World-Herald (Omaha, NE), pg. 18, col. 1 ad:
We Don’t Want to Work Nights!
We Don’t Want Our Employees to Work Nights!
Happy Employees Make Happy Customers!
We Are Not Open Nights…
SHOP DURING DAYLIGHT!
(Omaha Potato Market—ed.)
 
3 July 1955, Southtown Economist (Chicago, IL), classified ads, pg. 15, col. 4:
WORK TO MUSIC
Reputable South side company believes happy employees make good employees.
 
Google Books
Super Market Merchandising
Volume 27
1962
Pg. 39:
Happy employees make for happy customers. See how your employees perk up when you install beautifully-designed and quality- built Weber Cases.
 
24 June 1964, Kerrville (TX) Mountain Sun, pg. 4, col. 5 ad:
We think our employees believe in our dealership, in our Chevrolet products, in giving you honest value in a new or used car and in providing the finest service. In other words, happy employees make our customers equally happy.
(Petersons’ Auto Co.—ed.)
 
Google News Archive
17 March 1973, Daytona Beach (FL) Morning Journal, pg. 38, col. 2 ad:
ENJOY THE HAPPY WOOLCO FACES!
Happy employees make for happy shopping. Happy shopping makes happy Woolco customers and happy customers are Woolco’s stock in trade!
 
Google Books
Applied Marketing Principles
By J. Donald Weinrauch and William E. Piland
Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall
1979
Pg. 185:
The Marriott Corporation, restaurant and hotel chain, has concluded that happy employees make happy customers.
   
9 August 1992, St. Louis (MO) Post-Dispatch, “TWA Talks Show Signs of Strain” by Christopher Carey, pg. 1C:
“In the service industry, happy employees make for happy customers,” said Marc Spiegel, a spokesman for the TWA branch of the Air Line Pilots Association.
 
Google Books
15 September 1997, CIO, pg. 104, col. 3:
Egged on by the cheesy slogan that happy employees make happy customers, companies rammed cheer down their employees’ throats.
 
Google Books
Best Practices in Customer Service
Edited by Ron Zemke and John A. Woods
Amherst, MA: HRD Press; New York, NY: AMACOM
1999
Pg. 36:
To put it simply: happy employees make for happy customers. Happiness is contagious. It spreads quickly. The cornerstone of the success of the Marriott hospitality organization is the motto advanced by its founder, J. Willard Marriott: “Take care of the employees and they’ll take care of the customers.”
 
The Brand Builder Blog
Happy Employees = Happy Customers
Published 20051013 by Olivier Blanchard
Interesting point made by Brains On Fire’s Spike Jones today in regards to the link between employee happiness and customer service:
 
“Happy employees make happy customers. That’s where a good identity lives and breathes - and grows from. If any of the (wireless) carriers had the buy-in of their employees and actually cared about them (and took care of them), then things could start to change. (...) I’m talking about the real people that represent the identity on a daily basis.”
 
4Hoteliers
Do Happy Employees Really Make Happy Customers?
By Vijay Dandapani
Saturday, 16th June 2007
The Financial Times has an interesting article entitled “In the pursuit of happiness” that questions what has long been received wisdom - that happy employees make for happy customers - an axiom that has divine status in the hospitality industry.
 
Jacksonville Business Journal (FL)
Happy employees make for happy customers
by Dolly Penland, Correspondent
Date: Monday, April 21, 2008, 12:00am EDT - Last Modified: Thursday, April 17, 2008, 12:19pm EDT
Category: Small
Top local executive: David Miller
There’s the wrong way to treat employees and then there’s the “Brightway.”
 
The Globe and Mail (Canada)
Video
Happy employees make for happy customers
Globe and Mail Update
Published Tuesday, Jul. 27, 2010 1:01PM EDT
Last updated Wednesday, Oct. 06, 2010 12:41PM EDT
Tony Hsieh, CEO of e-tailer Zappos.com and author of ‘Delivering Happiness,’ on the science of good cheer and how it can help your business.
 
Overhead Bin on MSNBC.com
27 May 2011 11:19am, EDT
Happy employees, happy customers?
By Rob Lovitt, msnbc.com contributor
It’s a fact of life and travel that unhappy employees rarely give good service. After all, if you hate your job, it’s pretty hard to show your customers the love.
 
But do happy employees make for happy customers? It can’t hurt, suggests Robert Hohman, CEO of Glassdoor.com, which is releasing its second annual Travel Industry Report Card today.
 
Google Books
Six Tires, No Plan:
The impossible journey of the most inspirational leader that (almost) nobody knows
By Michael A. Rosenbaum
Austin, TX: Greenleaf Book Group Press
2012
Pg. 34:
“Happy employees make happy customers, but happy customers don’t always make for happy employees,” explains Tim Ehinger, vice president in the Detroit region.