Using retail staff as entertainment

[petshopboy]

Do you find that a lot of customers use retail staff as a form of entertainment and someone to talk to just for the sake of it?

I get them telling me their life story or asking me to how they can get things cheaper elsewhere or how they can make a product that we sell. "I don't need to know"

The worst is when you are busy and they ask "do you have any so and so fish", and you say yes and show them only to be told by them that they have a really big one and how much will you buy it for from them.

I love it when I say we are not interested, they just look dumbfounded

So many customers think they can just say anything to you and insult you because you are there to serve.
Usally customers like this are at the bottom of their social level and feel good ordering you about or whining to you.

[Shironu-Akaineko]

So many customers think they can just say anything to you and insult you because you are there to serve.

Hahahahahahahahahaha! Haahahaahaha!!! HAHAHAHAHAHAA!!!

oh yeah, aren't they cute when they do that?

They're not that cute when they learn that the lil baker replies the exact same way tho!

[earl colby pottinger]

Okay

I admit to telling part of my life story to people working who do not appear to be busy and it is an extension of what I came into the store to find in the first place. IE example that I am a BeOS developer, what is different about it and thus why I need certain info on a product they sell before I consider buying it.

But why would anyone think the story cares that you can make a certain product? They probably buy it in bulk and pre-made, thus at price that is less than what you can ever hope to match.

And buy a food item from a stranger of the street! Not in this day and age where so many products come in safety shields from day one.

What are these people thinking?

[Rapscallion]

Part of me thinks this is only fair - I often considered customers to be pretty entertaining, especially when they didn't think they were.

Rapscallion

[BookstoreEscapee]

There was a woman who came to Store2 a lot, ordering books on some kind of pottery collectibles or somesuch. She usually called to order over the phone, and she was very nice, but you were lucky if you got off the phone with her in less than 15-20 minutes.

[Ill_Used_Heroine]

The worst is when you are busy and they ask "do you have any so and so fish", and you say yes and show them only to be told by them that they have a really big one and how much will you buy it for from them.

I used to hate that! It would always be someone who didn't bother to do any research on the type of fish they bought to see exactly how large they could get. We always got people trying to sell us back their huge plecos and/or bala sharks. Damnit people! Do your homework and buy fish that aren't going to outgrow your crappy 10 gal. tank!

[mdog]

I get them telling me their life story or asking me to how they can get things cheaper elsewhere or how they can make a product that we sell. "I don't need to know"

I work in a gift store in the airport that happens to sell T-Shirts. This didn't happen to me, but one of my co-workers said that she was asked by someone if there was another shop in the airport that sells the same shirts that we do, but at cheaper prices.

Why do people think any sales clerk in any store would answer such a question?

[PetStoreKate]

The worst is when you are busy and they ask "do you have any so and so fish", and you say yes and show them only to be told by them that they have a really big one and how much will you buy it for from them.

I love it when I say we are not interested, they just look dumbfounded

Every. Day. OF MY LIFE.

Do you not see that this is a store full of overcrowded tanks?! Are there not signs that state us being a RETAIL, rather than CONSIGNMENT store!!????!?! Don't you think that if you had a GIGANTIC fish that has lasted you over 10 years you would invest in a bigger tank for it?

I had a customer call me every Sunday and ask if I would take his fish from him. Just two fish, he said. Well no, we can't do that because we don't have the room and the hygiene of your water is not guaranteed. At the end of maybe 6 weeks, he got incredibly upset and stormed into the store, demanding that I take his fish. Well sir, we can't.

So he waited until the first day that the temperature dropped below freezing and left the fish in the parking lot outside, in a bucket of dirty water, with a note that said "for the pet store b***h"

The kicker is that we REALLY didn't have room for the fish and I had to drive them out to a store 45 minutes away. And it had to be done right away - without oxygen in with these fish, they would have died. Time was of the essence. And, that they were a very -very- rare form of koi. If he had tried, he could have received at least $1000 per fish!!!

.... *headexplode*

I'm done hijacking your thread now!