You can leave the store

[Sams Mart Employee]

This isn't my story, but it is one of the Bike Assemblers, both great guys who fix anything around the store.
SC: Of course the Sucky Customer.
BA: Bike Assembler
SM: Store Manager

BA: Hello, do you need some help?
SC: Yes, I'd like this princess bike here, but I want one newly assembled.
BA: No a problem, I'll be back out in a bit.

Not an uncommon request, so he goes back and assembles the bike rather quickly, being he has done this for a long time. He rolls out the bike and the customer takes one look at it and...

SC: This bike has been used.
BA: No, I just finished building it ma'am.
SC: Liar!
BA: I assure you ma'am this is a brand new bike.
SC: Liar!!!!

At this point the Store Manager walks out.

SM: Is there a problem?
SC: Yes, your bike assembler here is claiming this is a brand new bike. Clearly it isnt , look their are finger prints on it.
BA: Yes, some of the parts come greasy sometimes....
SM: Ma'am I watched him build this bike.
SC: Well, I don't believe you.
SM: Well, you can just leave the store then.

And she was escorted out. A rare glimmer of management caring about us lowly associates.

[Bright_Star]

Did she want to watch the bike assembler put the bike together?

[Raveni]

SC: Yes, I'd like this princess bike here

It's pretty obvious if you look at what isn't being said here. The SC is obviously the spoiled princess, not her child.

[xaenon]

I'm kind of on the fence about this one.

On the one hand, yes, the customer was kinda bitchy. It's one thing to be upset the bike is dirty - but to accuse the assembler of being a liar is a bit over the top. And I probably would have told her to build her damn own bike, then walked away, taking the bike with me, if I'd been in his shoes.

On the other hand, the assembler probably could have prevented the entire episode by taking a moment to wipe the fingerprints and smudges off the bike before wheeling it out to the customer. I'm sure he's a great guy and a professional, but this step is kind of crucial. You wouldn't want your mechanic's greasy prints all over your car when you pick it up from the garage, would you? Automobile dealerships detail their cars before delivery, even if they're factory fresh. This is pretty much the same sort of situation.

I'm glad the manager stepped up and defended the employee, but I also think he could have defused the situation and had more positive results all around. If it were me, I'd have said something like, "Well, ma'am, I think accusing him of being a liar is uncalled for; after all, I watched him build the bike. And yes, perhaps he should have wiped it down before bringing it out...." and then I'd have asked the assembler to do exactly that. If she was still difficult, I'd have maybe knocked ten bucks off the price or something like that, because 'clean' is kind of an expectation for a new item. And AFTER the customer had left, I'd have simply told the assembler to make sure that bikes get wiped down before they're brought out to a customer.

Just my thoughts.

[downforit2008]

Put that dumb Sucky Customer right in her place! Glad to see the manager was willing to defend the employee instead of rolling over to the customer's every whim. Wish we all had managers just like that!

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

As somebody who used to have to get his own disgusting fingerprints all over bikes hauling them down to the floor from backstock, I think I can safely say this woman is about the only person in the world who freaks out about that kind of thing.

If my own over-entitled clientele don't notice or complain about those things, then it isn't a problem. The bike's going to be ridden outside and dirtied up anyhow.

It's a big box store, not a specialty bike store. The customer can wipe the fingerprints off their damn selves.

[xaenon]

As somebody who used to have to get his own disgusting fingerprints all over bikes hauling them down to the floor from backstock, I think I can safely say this woman is about the only person in the world who freaks out about that kind of thing.

If my own over-entitled clientele don't notice or complain about those things, then it isn't a problem. The bike's going to be ridden outside and dirtied up anyhow.

It's a big box store, not a specialty bike store. The customer can wipe the fingerprints off their damn selves.

I really ain't trying to take this into fratching, so this will be the last I say about it.
You may agree or disagree; that is your right. I'll only say this:

I've worked a few big-box stores myself. I've watched customers pick up a box of cereal, notice a tiny little crumple on one corner, and put it back on the shelf to get another 'unblemished' one. Rinse, lather, repeat, until there's just that ONE box, even when it's pretty damned apparent it couldn't possibly have damaged the product itself. Same with canned goods - even DOG food. The label's starting to peel off that 2-liter of Coke? It will sit there until the liquid inside achieves sentience if the Coca Cola delivery guy doesn't code it out and destroy it.

My most recent job was in a packaging plant, and they were absolute Nazis about ANY sort of blemish on the package. The tiniest little mark on the mylar packet some wet-wipes come in? THROW IT OUT. Even if you practically needed a magnifying glass to see it. The same was true of a product called (and I'm NOT making this up) BUTT PASTE - a diaper ointment. The machine was running funky one night and we ended up throwing THOUSANDS of dollars worth of ass-slime into the dumpster. Why? A tiny little cosmetic blemish on the edge of the package. It did not affect the product or the integrity of the package in the least little bit. It was, in fact, barely visible. And we were told to shit-can them.

I'm just pointing out that these ARE expectations that customers have. And in the case of the original post, those expectations could have been fulfilled by taking a few seconds, a minute at most, to wipe the bike down before wheeling it out to the customer. The situation probably would have been avoided altogether.

I am NOT defending the customer, much as it might seem I am. She became unnecessarily difficult and confrontational over what was, after all, a trivial matter - and calling the guy a liar is just one hundred percent pure USDA-prime WRONG, regardless of how upset she was. Definitely the majority of the blame can be placed here.

I think the manager's heart was in the right place, sticking up for his employees.

I don't think the bike assembler's a bad guy - it was just an oversight, and it could have been easily corrected had the customer not gone completely psychotic.

Now, having said all that, I'll concede that the customer probably wouldn't have been mollified. We all know how that works, right? My point, though, is nobody saw the opportunities to take corrective action.

[AccountingDrone]

My most recent job was in a packaging plant, and they were absolute Nazis about ANY sort of blemish on the package. The tiniest little mark on the mylar packet some wet-wipes come in? THROW IT OUT. Even if you practically needed a magnifying glass to see it. The same was true of a product called (and I'm NOT making this up) BUTT PASTE - a diaper ointment. The machine was running funky one night and we ended up throwing THOUSANDS of dollars worth of ass-slime into the dumpster. Why? A tiny little cosmetic blemish on the edge of the package. It did not affect the product or the integrity of the package in the least little bit. It was, in fact, barely visible. And we were told to shit-can them.

One of our old roomies worked for a toothpaste factory, we didn't buy toothpaste for about 5 years because he would bring it home from the overrun/crunch and dent bin. Sheffield Labs is a jobbing company, they make for everybody from Tom's of Maine to that uberchichi spa crap that comes in 'morning' and 'evening' varieties. [they change the formullary for each batch to whatever the company contracts for so it isn't like they just put the same glop in all the tubes.]

[there was some kind that was a really great vanilla mint that was not like being slapped in the face by a tree of mint, very nice stuff. Of course you can't buy it on the east coast, it was apparently for some spa on the west coast =(]

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

My most recent job was in a packaging plant, and they were absolute Nazis about ANY sort of blemish on the package. The tiniest little mark on the mylar packet some wet-wipes come in? THROW IT OUT. Even if you practically needed a magnifying glass to see it. The same was true of a product called (and I'm NOT making this up) BUTT PASTE - a diaper ointment. The machine was running funky one night and we ended up throwing THOUSANDS of dollars worth of ass-slime into the dumpster. Why? A tiny little cosmetic blemish on the edge of the package. It did not affect the product or the integrity of the package in the least little bit. It was, in fact, barely visible. And we were told to shit-can them.

I'm just pointing out that these ARE expectations that customers have.

To use your example of the packaging plant, once the toothpaste/butt paste/ whatever left your warehouse, it went into the store's distribution process, wherein an individual box is handled by about ten sets of hands before the customer actually buys it.

It gets tossed around, dropped on conveyor belts, put on the very top of a stack of boxes that fall down as the truck is being unloaded at the store, or beneath a bunch of heavy furniture or laundry detergent and gets crushed. This isn't to say you're not right to be anal about packaging, but there's a good chance that package isn't going to stay in pristine condition for the customer to purchase.

If people worked in retail for any length of time, their expectations you talk about would completely go away. We're just too understaffed and underpaid to care.

Finally, rest assured I wasn't trying to confront you in any way, and apologize if you felt I did.

[xaenon]

To use your example of the packaging plant, once the toothpaste/butt paste/ whatever left your warehouse, it went into the store's distribution process, wherein an individual box is handled by about ten sets of hands before the customer actually buys it.

It gets tossed around, dropped on conveyor belts, put on the very top of a stack of boxes that fall down as the truck is being unloaded at the store, or beneath a bunch of heavy furniture or laundry detergent and gets crushed. This isn't to say you're not right to be anal about packaging, but there's a good chance that package isn't going to stay in pristine condition for the customer to purchase.

If people worked in retail for any length of time, their expectations you talk about would completely go away. We're just too understaffed and underpaid to care.

Finally, rest assured I wasn't trying to confront you in any way, and apologize if you felt I did.

Agree. People who don't work in retail DON'T know what it's like, and if they did walk a mile in retail's shoes, they'd have an entirely perspective. I think that's true, also, of the upper-management types, who've either never actually worked on the front lines, or it's been so long since they have they don't remember. Likewise, I think that if the upper-management types actually put in an honest day's labor once in a while, they might think twice about a lot of the stupid policies they sign off on.

No confrontation was intended or perceived; but it looked like it might get close to fratching territory and I didn't want the mods to have to step in.

And oh, yeah, I'm hip to the 'underpaid and overworked' vibe, partner. It's hard to give a shit when you get dumped on all the time. I understand completely.

[Merriweather]

The machine was running funky one night and we ended up throwing THOUSANDS of dollars worth of ass-slime into the dumpster. Why? A tiny little cosmetic blemish on the edge of the package. It did not affect the product or the integrity of the package in the least little bit. It was, in fact, barely visible. And we were told to shit-can them.

We used to go to the "seconds" sections of the factory shops of the potteries when we lived in England (Spode, Royal Doulton, Wedgwood, etc) and play '"find the flaw". Then the ones we couldn't find the flaw on (or finally found, on the back, with a magnifying glass), we bought. I have tons of the best English china, bought for no more than the cheap stuff at Walmart would cost here. All because they wouldn't sell anything less than perfect in the regular shops.