Go Ahead, Make My Day: SELL ME SOMETHING

When I was working in retail, I’d inevitably lock horns with the store managers on a regular basis. Why? Because I’d spend time with my customers and actually sell them something. Wow! What a nut I was in those days! People would come into the store, and I’d do my best to wait on them and help them buy stuff. That’s what I thought I was supposed to do, anyway..

To my supervisors, though, I was just a renegade -- a rogue sales consultant if ever there was one. Yeah, it was personal, all right. Almost as if they resented my ability to make sales and increase profits. Now I’m not saying my sales were always THAT high. I’m not saying I was the perfect salesperson, either. I’m just saying they got their undies in a bunch whenever I tried to do my job:

* You’re spending too much time with your customers. Don’t get so involved.

* You don’t need to waste all that time calling different stores to check on sizes and styles we don’t have. Just sell what we already have in stock.

* Don’t do any special orders. Don’t send them over to our other store locations. Sell them what we have here -- even if they don’t want it.

* If it’s not out on the floor, we don’t have it. Whatever we have is out on the shelves. So don’t keep going back to check on things for them.

* You don’t need to keep a file on your customers with their phone numbers and addresses and likes and dislikes. We’re not paying you to do that. What’s the point, anyway?

And on and on. You get the idea. The suits got so obsessed with store policy that they started putting profits before people. For these anal-retentive managers, following orders became more important than putting the customer first. Forget about “the customer is always right.” Thanks to their marketing philosophy, the customer became a cipher -- and their businesses paid dearly for this rigid mindset.

Needless to say, all three stores I used to work at went out of business.

Despite all the economic downturns and hostile takeovers, I still say the success of your business greatly depends on how you treat your customers. It’s that simple. Treat them well, and they’ll keep returning to your store. Mistreat them -- by ignoring or invalidating them -- and you won’t have a business for long.

Before you dismiss my notions as old-fashioned, read what happened to me last weekend. The same things I wrestled with decades ago came back to haunt me (no pun intended). Only this time, I wasn’t in customer service, I was a customer myself.

History may not always repeat itself, but it sure can rhyme.

On Saturday, November 2nd, I went over to my favorite card/gift shop to check out Halloween novelties and decorations that hadn’t sold on October 31st. Sometimes you can find stuff you hadn’t noticed the week before. Sometimes you can find leftovers at 1/2 price. For as long as I’d shopped at this store, they’d always had a “1/2-price-after-Halloween Sale.” If they were going to change that tradition, you’d think they would have warned their customers. But they didn’t.

By the time I got there, all the Halloween stuff was gone. Gone? Less than 48 hours after Halloween night? I couldn’t believe it. Nothing was left?

“You didn’t sell it ALL, did you?” I asked the elder saleslady.

“No,” she said, “we had to pack everything up so we could send it off.”

“So soon? It’s just November 2nd...”

Firmly and coolly, she informed me of their new policy. “We had to make room for all the Christmas cards and things. Sorry.”

End of conversation. Did I ever feel like the world’s stupidest person for interfering -- even if my interference did involve trying to purchase items from her store.

I almost began to feel guilty for asking about their holiday packing and shipping plans. And here I was, a longtime valued customer with one of those Gold Crown Reward Cards, too. After being such a loyal customer for so long, you’d think this sales consultant would have asked me what I’d  been looking for, what I’d wanted to buy. She didn’t.

So I left and walked around the mall, checking out the other stores. Then later, on the way to my car, I thought, Wait a minute. I’m a good customer. I’ve always been a good customer. So why couldn’t somebody let me buy something?

I returned to the store. No employee was in sight. No customers were there, either.

As I wandered around, looking for some signs of life, another younger saleslady approached me and asked if I needed any help.

“I know you’ve packed away the Halloween things,” I began, “but did you send them out already?”

“No, the boxes are still here,” said saleslady #2.

So I told her about the spooky sign I’d wanted to buy.

Right away, she knew exactly what I was talking about. She even knew where it was.

“Yeah, I know which one you mean,” she told me, “and I think I know which box it’s in, too.”

But here’s the real scary part: she had to ask the elder sales- lady for permission to open the box and sell it to me!

Look, I understand that company policies are intended to promote maximum efficiency and uniformity in chain stores. I get it. I also realize that these carefully constructed rules are designed to make everything function smoother for employees and employer alike. But what about the customers? Shouldn’t their wants and needs be considered at some point in the corporation’s equation?

I finally got to buy what I wanted. But only after making two different trips to the store and pleading with two different sales consultants for my right to purchase an item they tried to hide from me. Not very convenient for me as a customer.

Immediately ridding the shelves of all remnants of Halloween as early as November 1st -- before any 1/2 price discounts could take effect -- might be convenient for you, The Shopkeeper. Setting out Christmas displays and merchandise right after Halloween and before Thanksgiving might be an important part of your corporate sales strategy. I understand. But understanding your M.O. doesn’t mean I have to like it.

If your customers don’t like what you’re doing, maybe you ought to reconsider your holiday marketing strategy. In fact, if your customers find anything you do or say annoying or unwelcome, maybe you should just stop whatever it is that you’re doing or saying. Stop alienating the reason you went into business in the first place. Listen to you customers. Include them in your business plans once in a while.

That means if your shoppers tell you that two months of Christmasy background music in your store makes them want to scream, turn off the music. Play “Silent Night” around the 3rd week of December --not on the 1st week of November.

I know, I know, the holiday shopping season is unbelievably short this season because Thanksgiving falls on November 28th. And over half of any retailer’s profits usually comes from Christmas sales. Yeah, I get it.

And yet, every time I do try to suggest ways retailers can make more money, they recoil. Then they start reading the riot act to me, complete with excerpts from their store’s manifesto. But it’s not about educating me, it’s about putting down customers like me.

Their knee-jerk reaction comes across loud and clear. It’s our store -- not your store. And because we own it, we can operate it any way we want to. Our store, our rules.

Of course, what you’re telling me IS true. I can only say that with your attitude, you’re going to go bankrupt like the other three stores I used to work at. You’ll have no one to blame but yourselves, either.

If you don’t start paying attention to what your customers want and need from your business, you won’t have a business anymore.

Go ahead. Make all the silly rules you want for your retail stores. Just remember, rules are supposed to make everyone’s lives easier -- not act as road blocks that interfere with customer service and profits.

And now I must go. I have a little shopping to do. But I’m not going back to any store that refuses to sell me what I want to buy.