Tyler brûlé this weekend called on London to get with it if they want to remain competitive.

He has a point – or two. As I discussed on many occasions in the past here, Asia’s service levels are unmatched, so no surprises here. On the contrary, Western service levels seem to be going the opposite way and that’s the scary part.

Exhibit a: At a recent investment conference on China in NY, American Airlines was one of the sponsors and the VP for sales approached me after my panel.

After giving him an earful about how bad my experiences with Airlines Anonymous had been, he, to his credit, admitted that Emirates’ economy was better than their first- ouch.

Exhibit b: After landing in HK earlier this week I am at the spa and in comes one of the attendants, looks at me and without missing a beat says: “welcome back Mr. Enskat, how is NY?”. The last time I saw him was in April. Well, that’s the Mandarin, so not really surprising.

So let’s go to a better example,

exhibit c: the same night I go to one of my favorite Vietnamese places at IFC two, Lian. I sit down and one of the waiters comes up to me and welcomes me back. I smile and say “good memory”, and he goes on to say “last time you were sitting over there with your two colleagues- will they be joining you tonight?”. Ridiculous.

Wherever you look and go in Asia, it surprises you, positively. Only the former is true for the West and unfortunately not in a good way.

As Brûlé pointed out, London and the rest of the West have a lot of work to do “to stay relevant”.

As I am finishing a mushroom risotto and espresso at Classified on Hollywood road, a young Asian girl finishes her cappuccino, pays, and drives off in her red Ferrari.

Time to listen to Dylan.