How many of us have ever walked around a retail store in search of an item, give up the search, and ask a store associate for assistance. Ok, admit it… everyone has (or else they are too ashamed to admit it). The other day, a customer approached me. She was not entirely sure if I was working (apparently, the huge cart with crates of milk did not convince her).
“Excuse me, do you work here?”
“Well… I think so.” (I was a bit confused)
She then asked the location of the rice. I tried to be as tactful as possible when I told her that she was standing right in front of it. I’ll give her the benefit of the doubt since her back was turned to it. However, I knew she just wanted to crawl in a hole as she turned around only to come face-to-face with bags of regular rice, boxes of Minute Rice, boxes of Rice-a-Roni, and other variations on a theme.
This reminded me of another incident involving a customer who was having difficulty while searching for an item. I will never forget the time my cousin (who does read my blog) came in and asked if we sold sun-dried tomatoes. I approached the store manager at the time who looked at me with a bewildered expression and asked:
“Why the heck would I carry sun-dried tomatoes? Those would be one of the deadest items I could ever carry. I would be stuck with them for years.”
What a guy, tactful to a fault. Personality though… wet blanket (is that a term?). He was probably right, though; I don’t see sun-dried tomatoes being a big seller in our small store and they would probably sit on the shelf in danger of becoming outdated.
And from a personal observation… do they still make Spicy Guacamole Pringles (Potato CRISPS)? I asked the boss today if we could carry them. They are the best variety of the bunch (much better I am sure than the NEW DILL PICKLE variety). Unfortunately, she looked in her big ordering book and came up empty. Sorry game night fans. Verrry interrrresting… after searching on the Pringles website, I have discovered that the spicy guacamole variety is still around.
I’m not embarrassing about asking an employee where something is…
But how many of us have been asked where something is when we don’t even work there? It happens when you wear a blue shirt to Walmart, a red shirt to Kmart… you get the drift. And it IS embarrassing when you’re the one who asks an employee where something is who turns out not to be an employee at all!