Having fun thinking about what products (chewing gum, nail polish, hair conditioner) I would endorse aside, lately the CONSUMERIST me has been tweaked by too many bad experiences with products and services which translates on the sales floor level to clerks who are jerks and on the corporate level to making hay while the sun continues to set.
At a time when we all need to be stimulating our ever failing economy (We all know those unemployment rates do not reflect those who ran out of unemployment and are now loosing everything they ever earned), the effort of dealing with these businesses (including one increasingly shitty "non-profit" gym) is to the point where it hardly seems worth the time and energy to complain to them (as if someone who earns their living there would care) or even the Consumer Bureau, which also has unpaid volunteers answering the phones these days, taking a guess at what you oughta do.
Instead, since the personal is political, what I have to say about these experiences to anyone who will listen (including strangers I encounter here, there, and everywhere) has become my high art of putting them out of business (or at least making informed and wary customers of the next sucker who goes in to buy.) Yes, my frustration and anger has become that of the bitter complainer so BUYER BEWARE.
I haven't purchased a thing besides underwear from an indoor shopping mall for a few years now! The last time I went to an indoor shopping mall I felt henpecked by fake phony clerks who kept asking me store after store "How are you today?" Never had more people staged a concern over my well being and as a gambit to sell me something.
I felt for all these people desperate to make a living and keep their jobs while on commission, but I left remembering why I mail order.
I also remembered being a clerk myself (back when it was an art in itself) and one never pretended to be overly familiar with a stranger or forgot they there to serve!
After you buy (and spend all that time and money on transportation) to get there, the product falls apart. Surprise! Made in China! So you call the store and someone of the phone says "Can you come in with your receipt?" I did that recently, spending over an hour to get back to the place, and the manager of the store stared at me and denied anyone ever said they would fix the problem, as if it were out of his pocket! It's almost as if they count on you NOT bringing back products because it's too much effort. That means manufacturers are not being held to excellence. Instead they figure how much shabby they can get away with!
Oh, but they want you to take that SURVEY on your receipt so corporate can find out if you were happy with your last visit.
Speaking of shabby, service in the stores seems over unless it's a very expensive store indeed. I think I can speak for you too! Aren't we sick of walking miles of isles trying to find products or someone to ask for help or direction, rude employees at the gym (who aren't even pretending they see the correlation between your membership and their job (Are they talking down to me because I'm not fit?) and products that fall apart (Wore those tennis shoes twice before the insides came unsewn and rubbed blisters into my feet) or that you cannot try on in a store (No dressing rooms? Guess at what bra size you wear?) and are not returnable (Didn't you see the sign?), is at an all time high as our economy continues to fall apart.
Writing this has made me feel (just slightly) better!
C Christine Trzyna 2011 All Rights Reserved including Internet Rights and International Rights
