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EP 008
26 Min
Rebag sells Chanel, Hermès, and Louis Vuitton, where one mistake can cost a customer's trust. Brandol Guerra, who leads customer service there, says AI can absolutely feel premium, but only if you teach it the attributes that are non-negotiable.
Most AI-in-support conversations are about volume and efficiency. Luxury is different: customers expect premium, personalized service, not a generic chatbot. Brandol Guerra is Associate Director of Customer Service at Rebag, the luxury handbag resale marketplace, after years at global BPOs like Sutherland and Teleperformance. On this episode of the Fini Podcast, he explained how to make AI feel premium, what he refuses to automate, and how a Six Sigma mindset sharpens both.
Meet Brandol Guerra
Brandol has spent over a decade in customer experience leadership, moving from large BPOs into an in-house role at Rebag, where the product is high-value and trust is everything. He brings a Six Sigma background focused on eliminating waste, and he is leading the integration of AI into a business that cannot trade quality for efficiency.
Making AI feel premium
For Brandol, premium starts by defining the attributes you want the AI to deliver, then training for them. An AI agent is an extension of your business, one more team member, so it has to recognize when someone is upset or frustrated and respond accordingly. That depends on getting the inputs right: the key questions for each scenario and the keywords the AI should identify. He frames training an AI almost like teaching it about human behavior, which is why you map everything before going live. Premium also means efficient, because every mistake is costly, so the goal is an agent that connects and resolves quickly, grounded in a strong knowledge base so accuracy is never the thing it has to worry about.
What stays human
Brandol's rule for what to automate is friction. AI is great for troubleshooting and how-to questions, but the moment a customer has invested too much time or the process carries too much friction, the AI should escalate to a person who can pick up where it left off. He is specific about what he will not automate: a customer ready to purchase (you never want to add friction to a sale), a broken payment or checkout, and change management, like explaining how the business is evolving after a launch. Those are moments where a human needs to take over to avoid losing the customer.
From BPO speed to in-house experience
Having run support at big BPOs, Brandol is candid about the difference in-house. In a BPO, every minute has a cost, so teams rush to end the call, which quietly sacrifices the attention to detail that defines real customer experience. In-house, you can build processes and teach your team the value behind every step, why empathy, why attention, why the flow. His Six Sigma lens is about eliminating waste, and his favorite example is an AI that flagged "this customer is frustrated" but not the details or the next step, so a top agent doing well over a hundred cases a day still wasted time interpreting it. The fix was not more automation, it was rewriting what the AI was prompted to capture, based on direct feedback from the agent using it.
Spotting promoters and detractors early
The move Brandol credits for lifting Google and Better Business Bureau ratings is reading the interaction early. His team is trained to tell within the first few minutes whether a customer is a promoter or a detractor, then adapt the flow instead of marching a frustrated customer through a script. The other half is proactive: after a tough interaction, the team calls the customer back, and about half the time people were upset not because the issue went unresolved, but because they could not express what they needed in the moment. Once they cool down, an agent helps them shape it. As he puts it, the difference between what a customer wants and what they actually need is where good resolutions come from, and it is not a sin to say "let me circle back."
What support leaders should take from this
Define the non-negotiable attributes first. Decide what premium means for you, then train the AI on the keywords and questions that detect it.
Automate by friction, not by category. Let AI handle troubleshooting and how-tos, and escalate the moment a customer has spent too long or the process gets heavy.
Never automate a sale or a broken checkout. A customer ready to buy, or stuck paying, needs a person, not a protocol.
Fix the input, not just the model. When AI output is unhelpful, the problem is usually what you asked it to capture. Get feedback from the agents using it.
Read promoters and detractors early. Adapt the flow in the first minutes, and call detractors back once they have cooled down.
Train teams on need versus want. Teach the team (and the AI) to find what the customer actually needs, not just what they first ask for.
Listen to the full episode
Brandol goes deeper on training teams to embrace AI, using Six Sigma to cut waste, and where to start in a luxury brand, in the full episode of the Fini Podcast. You can connect with him on LinkedIn.
AI that feels premium and hands off cleanly when trust is on the line is what Fini is built for. Book a demo to see it in action.
How do you deploy AI in a luxury customer service environment?
Brandol Guerra starts by defining the attributes that make service premium, then trains the AI on the key questions and keywords that detect them, like recognizing when a customer is upset. He grounds the AI in a strong knowledge base so it is accurate and efficient, treating it as an extension of the team rather than a generic chatbot.
What should stay human in luxury support?
Brandol keeps humans on anything where friction risks losing the customer: a shopper ready to purchase, a broken payment or checkout, and change management like explaining how the business is evolving. AI handles troubleshooting and how-to questions, then escalates when a customer has invested too much time.
How does Six Sigma apply to AI in customer service?
Six Sigma targets waste. In Brandol's example, an AI flagged that a customer was frustrated but not the details or the next step, so an agent wasted time interpreting it. The fix was rewriting what the AI was prompted to capture, based on feedback from the agent using it.
What's the difference between BPO and in-house customer experience?
In a BPO every minute has a cost, so teams rush to end interactions, sacrificing attention to detail. In-house, you can build processes and teach the team the value behind empathy, attention, and the interaction flow, shifting from customer service to customer experience.
