Just Who Did He Think He Was?

[Jester]

Apparently this happened some months back, but I just heard about it yesterday at work.

One day, a guy walked into The Bar with some guidebooks (more like pamplets) he was promoting. Apparently, these guidebooks were for self-guided tours of Key West, with advertising from various businesses in Key West, and featuring, for the most part, pictures of this guy and his wife at the various stops described in the tour. Hardly the most professional thing around.

Anyway, this guy walked in and dropped a stack of them off at the hostess stand, apparently for customers to pick up for free. A few problems with that. 1. He didn't clear this with the management. 2. He didn't even bother saying anything to the hostess on duty, he just dropped them off and split. 3. The Bar was NOT one of the advertisers in said guidebook.

At the time, Boss Man was in the bar area, playing his favorite video game. A while after the dropoff, Boss Man wandered over to the hostess stand and noticed these guidebooks. He asked the hostess about them, and she told him what she knew, i.e., the guy had just dropped them off without a word. Being a no-nonsense kind of guy, Boss Man dumped the stack into the trash by the hostess stand, and thought nothing more of it.

A little while later, the guidebook guy wandered by for whatever reason, and noticed that his guidebooks were no longer on display. He came in, saw the stack of guidebooks in the trash, and started berating the hostess. "What the hell are you doing? Why are my guidebooks in the trash? Why did you throw them out? Who the hell do you think you are?" Etc., etc., etc.

The hostess was taken aback, but informed the dude that he would need to speak to the manager, and pointed out Boss Man, who was back in the bar playing the aforementioned video game. So Guidebook Guy approached Boss Man, and started going off about how bad Boss Man's staff was, and how they just dumped his guidebooks in the trash, etc.

Did I mention that Boss Man is a no-nonsense kind of guy? Yeah, well, he lit into Guidebook Guy really quickly. He told the dipshit that it wasn't his staff that threw away the guidebooks, it was him. After all, The Bar did not advertise with the guidebook, no one had checked with him about putting them out, and no one had bothered even calling about it. They had just dumped them in The Bar, so Boss Man felt no compunction about dumping them in the trash.

At this point, Guidebook Guy started lighting into Boss Man, telling him that Boss Man should have at least called him (Guidebook Guy) before trashing his books.

That is when Boss Man felt that he had had enough. "Check with you? What? Are you out of your mind? You never bothered checking with me to see if you could put your books out in my bar, and I am supposed to CALL YOU to see if I can throw out something you left behind without my permission? I don't think so. This is MY bar. I don't have to check with you about anything regarding what I do in MY bar. It's time for you to leave. Get the fuck out of my bar. NOW. And I don't want to see you OR your books in here ever again."

Boss Man was PISSED. Guidebook Guy's wife was smart enough to drag him out of there, even though he wanted to stay and argue.

What a fucking douchebag.

Have I mentioned how much I love working for these people?

[customersruinmylife]

What an idiot. But hats off to your boss though, the guy totally deserved it.

This reminds me of something that happened at my bar. We have a large stand full of guidebooks. Someone from a RIVAL bar came in, removed a stack of books and put in leaflets promoting his bar in their place!

Let's just say they were returned, soaked in...well

[aurelemsrealm]

Working a part-time job at a convenience store and a work-study job at a natural history museum, I see a lot of people wanting to drop off flyers and pamphlets advertising their business, cause, whatever. It's really fun when the more aggressive ones try to grill me wanting to know why when I say that it will have to be cleared with a supervisor. Let's just say that it's not a good idea to push me when I politely give the correct answer because the supervisor may be pursuaded to refuse. I can pretty well guage (and influence) my supervisors at both jobs on many decisions.

[Record Store Tough Guy]

We got a lot of local bands asking if they could put up posters or leave fliers in our store, newither of which we could do because of stupid uptight corporate rules. What we would do, though, was take a stack, keep them behind the counter, and give them to regulars that we thought would dig the bands. We would have liked to have done more, but that's part of the territory with a corporate record store.

[Jester]

Yes, but the point is that the bands were cool with your setup (at least it seemed to sound that way) and didn't force their fliers on you, and were probably happy you were willing to do that much for you. More to the point, they didn't say you should have called them if you weren't going to display their fliers.

I am still amazed by the gall of the guy, and frankly, bummed that I wasn't there that day. Boss Man is cool as shit, but when he gets pissed, he is not someone you want to deal with....but it is hellaciously funny to watch him get pissed and go off on someone else, especially a non-employee!

[Record Store Tough Guy]

Oh yeah, the dude in the story was a complete asshat. We'd do the same as Bossman if they just dumped them on the counter and left. Nobody had the stones to come back and yell at us though. That's a special kind of entitlement right there.

[Mordecai]

Your boss has major cajones, man. If something like that had happened at my old job, my GM most likely would have given him some passes and tried to hurry him out, but in a somewhat curteous manner.