How to be a Customer: Lesson 4

Here we are again, ladies and jellyspoons. I must break away from the FFX-2 so as to deliver my missives! The holiday season is almost upon us, and these last two lessons must get through!

(As a sidenote, it's an odd sensation to be throwing the rough/blog edition of Lesson 4 up on the site, revising the first two lessons for 210 West, and waiting for the Prologue to post in said publication tomorrow. Especially since this will end up being Lesson 5 in the final draft. Whew.)

Enough talk-ink! Lesson jetzt! I mean, now!

Lesson #4: You are not the only customer here.

I realize we live in a country where egocentrism is an expected viewpoint, but I don't care. The customer I am currently talking to is a nice person (If I'm lucky), and they have valid questions/concerns that need addressing. In other words, this is not the time for the Selfish You to rip off the mask of humanity and ask me where the latest inane pop/rap/country/rock release is!

(Besides, it's right next to you, you egocentric bastard. Maybe, if you actually learned to focus on something besides yourself, you would have noticed it. Ass.)

Allow me to provide you with another random insight into the workings of retail. Odds are, the day you stop in is the day that we're understaffed. It happens, and it will happen. Often. It's just one way for the company to stay in the black. (Unless it's MegaSoullessCorp, in which case they'll just fire anybody who's worked long enough to get paid a decent wage.)

Ladies and gentlemen, guess what? Despite the obvious rage in these lessons, we want to help you. We desire it. We will stop putting out product. We will stop putting up displays. We will stop the conversation with the significant other who is on the verge of breaking up with us... just to help you out. Seriously.

Nothing feels better that when a customer comes back, and thanks you for a recommendation. We like to validate our existence, and our nice administrative superiors like it when we give customers a reason to keep shopping with us. However, there are usually more of you than there are of us. Remember the Undisclosed Law of Sociodynamics:

"The amount of help you want/need is directly proportional to the total sum of customers and the square of customers who already want/need help."

Just give us some time, and we will provide you with our attention.

Today's Example: Mein Gott in Himmel, where do I start? How about the first subject, a middle-aged man/woman who interrupted my answer to another customer. He/she simply bellowed, "Hey, guy. Cassettes?" in an accusatory manner. To which I responded by pointed them, less than ten feet directly in front of him.

(And here I'll pause for sub-lesson 4.1: Don't call me "guy." Or "buddy." I'm will scream "uhm nuhm shemum" and rip out your still beating heart, a la Temple of Doom. "Dude" is fine, "sir" is preferred. Or you could look at the "-J." printed across my lanyard, and call me that. This goes cross-gender, as well. If you call any of my female associates "chick" or "babe", you deserve the unspeakable horrors she will visit upon your sorry, sorry ass. End of sub-lesson.)

Then there was the young man/woman who was in line. The person before him/her was returning an item. One of those long, complicated reasons for returning; but, he/she was an occasional customer, and had a valid point. After a while, the waiting customer started interrogating the other customer about taking so much time, driving him/her out of the store in annoyance. If there were such a thing as justified defenestration, that waiting customer would be the justification.

The final subject is the general "person shopping in a hurry." Slow the hell down. You should always allot more time than you need to shop. When you don't, you get angry, frustrated, and start bending Lesson #4. Then you break it, and give the nice retail employee a verbal assault. Bad idea. You really don't want me to retaliate, because then the nice police officers will need to go on a mall-wide scavenger hunt for the various parts of your body.

Relax. Slow down. Be considerate. As much as your inflated sense of self may seem to justify your pointless existence, you really aren't more important than the other ten people trying to ask me a question.

And if you're shopping on a tight schedule, you are a stupidhead.

Next Lesson: No, we don't have that in stock.