"Put it back up!"

[Rine]

I had a whiny customer today. She came in, on her cellphone and asked for gazebos, so I point her back to the book and the one gazebo we still have on display.

It is October. Everything patio furniture is clearanced. All of our displays have been sold or taken down, except that one she's looking at. We had to put our Trim Shop and Christmas tree forest up.

So I show the one gazebo and convert the inches to feet for her because she didn't understand 174" by 154" by whatever the diameter was.

She sees a gazebo we have in the book and she wants to see it. Okay. We can't. We took it down.

Me: We already took that gazebo down.
SC: Well, where is it? In a box somewhere?
Me: We just have the display left and it's sitting on a moving cart right now.

SC and me go over to the cart and she feels the material of the gazebo and can see the fabric it's made out of.

SC: Put it back up! I need someone to put this together so I can see it!
Me: I'm sorry, we can't. We don't have the room for it. It's a big gazebo.
SC: How am I supposed to buy it without seeing it?
Me: I do have that picture in the sale book if you would like to look at it again.
SC: No, I need someone to put it together so I can see it!
Me: I'm sorry, we can't, ma'am.
SC: Are you sure? It won't take long!
Me: We don't have any space left to properly assemble it.

We go back and forth for a little while and she gives up. Manager wanders by when he hears the discussion and confirms what I'm saying. That doesn't help the situation but at least I got manager's word! She complains the whole time and buys the other gazebo which I have new in the box. She got mad when I wouldn't sell her that display. I couldn't sell it because I had new ones!

We didn't have the space, honest to god. We had our entire Christmas shop nearly completely filled up and practically the rest of lawn and garden was a mess, especially what was left of the patio furniture.

She could have bought the gazebo based on the picture and gotten that display at a ridiculously low price, but nope. She bought one a hundred dollars more. I guess that's good for the store, but she could have gotten a good gazebo for much cheaper.

Honestly, I think we would have put it back together...if we just had the space on that salesfloor!

[HALFHUMANHALFZOMBIE]

#1 she wasn't serious about wanting service on the gazebos because she was yapping away on her friggin cell phone.

#2 She physically sees everything that the product has in addition to what it looks like when you stand it up.

#3 if she insists that it won't take long it should be easy for her to set it up herself.

I sense some *durr*ness, stupidity, disrespect, patience testing, crazyness, and unpoliteness in this story no doubt.

[El Pollo Guerrera]

If I ever have to describe lengths in feet or inches, I look at the fluorescent lights. Most fluorescents in stores around here are either 4' or 8' bulbs.

"So, 174 inches is around 14 feet... see that bulb there? That's 8 feet, so this gazebo is from here (scruffs an imaginary line in the floor, moves back the length of around 2 bulbs) to here."

Another measure I use is floor tiles... most are about 1 foot square.

For me, that tends to end any size questions.

Yeah, I get that this was a SC on different levels, but I thought I'd give a little tip. Hope it helps someone sometime.

[Antisocial_Worker]

Just be glad it wasn't a level 9 gazebo. The SC would surely have sent you in to attack it rather than face it herself. ...And then no one could have helped you. You would have been forced to face the gazebo alone...

[ReverendBSB]

Hoody Hoo!

[Iris Kojiro]

Just be glad it wasn't a level 9 gazebo. The SC would surely have sent you in to attack it rather than face it herself. ...And then no one could have helped you. You would have been forced to face the gazebo alone...

That and you know she wouldn't have been prepared enough to bring support items in case he went down or got some kind of status ailment.

[bunnyboy]

nah the Gazeebo woulda jut eaten her after she angered it.

[Bright_Star]

That's what pictures are for...lol.

[HawaiianShirts]

If I ever have to describe lengths in feet or inches, I look at the fluorescent lights. Most fluorescents in stores around here are either 4' or 8' bulbs.

"So, 174 inches is around 14 feet... see that bulb there? That's 8 feet, so this gazebo is from here (scruffs an imaginary line in the floor, moves back the length of around 2 bulbs) to here."

Another measure I use is floor tiles... most are about 1 foot square.

It amazes me how many people have problems with size without something to visualize it by. I use our store's shelving system. All of our shelves came in 4-foot sections and were then assembled on the sales floor into the layout we currently have. So when customer are looking for, say, Ethernet cables, I can have a conversation like this with them...

Customer: Where are your Ethernet cables?
Me: Here. I have them in 3-, 7-, 14-, 25-, and 50-foot increments.
Customer: Uh... I don't know how long of a cable I need... Probably the 3-foot would be fine; it's the cheapest.
Me: If it helps, these shelves are each four feet long. (I physically point out shelf section length.)
Customer: Oh... Well... (He counts off three of the shelving units, pauses, then counts off four.) The 14-foot might be long enough... (Paces off the whole aisle, which is six shelving units, so 24 feet.) Y'know, gimme the 25-footer, just to make sure it'll reach.

(This conversation is true, but it is one of the more extreme examples. Most people don't make this drastic a change from their original choice.)

[Enjis]

Just be glad it wasn't a level 9 gazebo. The SC would surely have sent you in to attack it rather than face it herself. ...And then no one could have helped you. You would have been forced to face the gazebo alone...

Lol! Do you read Knights of the Dinner Table?
That Gazebo will never harm this town again!

[Rine]

A co-worker called me and told me she came back today and returned the gazebo she bought! And then she got mad when they told her the gazebo she wanted to see put up in the store had been sold. Sorry, first come first serve! She then got mad when they charged her a restocking fee (about 22 dollars in this case) because she took everything out of the box, practically destorying it, and lost the instruction book for it.

I understand the need to visualize something...I have to do that myself. But I can visualize inches just as well as feet. I didn't think about using a prop to help out, though I have in the past. The tiles on the floor are one foot in width, so I use that a lot to judge distances for displays and whatnot. Our shelving is also four feet in length...that's a good tip to use those too. Thanks everyone.

edit to say: @Hauntedheadnc--I'm ashamed to say it took me a few minutes to figure out your reference! You know, I think I've been killed by that card before.

[BrightEyedKitty]

Then we can go lynch that davenport...

[Antisocial_Worker]

Lol! Do you read Knights of the Dinner Table?
That Gazebo will never harm this town again!

I know which KOTDT you're referring to, but mainly I just play Munchkin.

At Denny's.

In the middle of the night.

edit to say: @Hauntedheadnc--I'm ashamed to say it took me a few minutes to figure out your reference! You know, I think I've been killed by that card before.

It was your own fault. Didn't you know better than to pick up a duck in a dungeon?