So what type of shopper are you? After years of working in retail, I know them all. There’s “Just looking, leave me alone, I’ll come to you when I need you and you better help me then,” shopper. There’s the “I’m just here with my wife because she made me come” shopper. There’s “Oh my god I’m at the mall and you should see what they have on sale, and what are you wearing to the dance on Friday,” talking on the cell phone shopper. There’s the creepy lurking silent “I might steal something” shopper. The list goes on and on…
I’m usually the quiet and polite “Just looking. Please don’t come up and give me a sales pitch,” type. Case in point…J and I were at the mall yesterday doing another undercover swap. Not really, but it seems that way. He loves cell phones and had met someone on Craigslist who wanted to trade their new phone for his…yada yada yada….I don’t even own a cell phone but those of you who do will probably get this. So, we’ve met people twice at the mall lobby to trade phones before. It always makes me laugh because it’s like, “go to the mall and stand in the lobby and wait for Fat Tony. You’ll know him when you see him. If not, he’ll know you.”
J was content in waiting in the car because we were there 30 minutes early. I decided to kill time by going in and perusing the Walden Books. Okay, I’m guilty. I know I always preach about saving your local bookstore. But here I am in Walden books checking out the covers of all kinds of titles, and I didn’t buy a single one. I made mental notes of a ton of stuff so I could go home and see if I could get them any cheaper on line. We all do it, don’t we? I rarely pay full price for a book these days thanks to internet shopping. Yeah, yeah, I know…I have to wait and pay shipping and by buying it in the store, I’m paying someone’s salary. But here’s my point…
I like an establishment where the employee might say hi or ask if I need assistance, but then walks politely away when I tell them I’m just looking. Or maybe they give me their name and tell me they’ll be right over there if I do need anything. In retail, I was always taught that every customer at least gets a greeting. 9 out of 10 customers don’t want to come to you and bother you so they wait around to be approached. Well, that’s not me but I’d been waiting all day in this store if I did do that. Not a single person said hello or even approached me. One employee even said excuse me to walk in front of me down an aisle, but no how are you or can I help you find anything or squat.
I probably would not have bought anything anyway, but it’s at least nice for someone to ask me if I need assistance. I hate being invisible. But good service is hard to find these days, believe me. We went to Michael’s craft store also yesterday, and had to ask the cashier where something was while we were checking out because there was no one on the floor to ask. The “I make 5 dollars an hour and don’t know where shit is” teeny bop cashier told us, “If we carry that it’ll be on the floor and everything is out.” Well, guess what? We don’t know where on the floor it is and saying everything is out just means you don’t want to have to go check the stockroom!
At Petco yesterday, it’s pretty much the same story. Ten minutes to closing time and all we need is a bag of dogfood and not one person on the floor even says hello even though we didn’t need help. We knew exactly where it was and got in, got it, and went to the front. But the 18 year old cashier is too busy having a conversation with the other cashier to even say hello. She checks us out like some robot. We’d been better off going through a self-checkout lane.
Which is exactly what we did at Lowes! We bought 3 things which we had trouble finding, but we did find them all on our own. Not a single person on the floor asked us if we needed help, and I saw plenty of them in their red vests. I always think of that silly Lowes commercial where the people are greeted immediately upon walking in the door. Hell, I’ve hunted employees down before only to be told they don’t work in that department, but then they don’t offer to get someone who does! So, we went through the self checkout lane and did it all by ourselves contently while some blond chick at the end of the aisle said “have a nice day” when we left. Geez, I wonder how much they pay her?
So, what kind of shopper am I? I must be an old fogy whose behind in the times because God knows good service these days is completely gone. I’m the shopper who says, “Screw you store. If you can’t train your employees to be friendly and knowledgeable, then I’ll go home and turn on my computer and shop on line.” I’d rather deal with shipping charges then to go in your store and feel like a guest at a party who no one is going to speak to. Why were you sales down 1st quarter? What’s up with the Economy? You can blame retailers for that. They might as well fire all their employees and install nothing but self-check out lanes up front because no one is going to help you anyway. Go get your shit and bring it to the front and check yourself out. With all the money they save because they don’t have to pay people to stand there and look pretty, their sales will be through the roof.
That’s why I have no qualms about taking my $200 cart full of groceries through the self check out lane. Yeah, it’s the grocery store where no one is expected to help you anyway. So, why should they check me out too. I’ll do that myself. I’ll pay you myself. I’ll bag my stuff myself. I’ll put it in my car all by myself. Send the pimply faced teens back home to play video games and mooch off Mommy and Daddy because their work ethic sucks! If employers can’t teach you quality skills to make you a better person and a better worker, then no one can.
(steps off soap box and goes shopping ON THE INTERNET)
