# Arrogant clueless store owner meets brick wall of reality with face
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arrogant-clueless-store-owner-meets-brick-wall-of-reality-with-face/560527
**Category:** The BBQ Pit
**Created:** [November 13, 2010, 3:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arrogant-clueless-store-owner-meets-brick-wall-of-reality-with-face/560527 "2010-11-13T03:48:54Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 2
### Author:  [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)
#### Post date: [November 13, 2010, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arrogant-clueless-store-owner-meets-brick-wall-of-reality-with-face/560527/21 "2010-11-13T18:27:51Z")
Oh. woo. Got it.
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### Author:  [@Peremensoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peremensoe)
#### Post date: [November 13, 2010, 6:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arrogant-clueless-store-owner-meets-brick-wall-of-reality-with-face/560527/22 "2010-11-13T18:30:10Z")
> [@kaylasdad99](#):
>
> Krishnas have a dietary restriction on onions and garlic? What the hell is that about?
See [here](http://connect.krishna.com/node/612) for a lengthy explanation from a Krishna. In part,
> [@](#):
>
> According to Ayurveda, India’s classic medical science, foods are grouped into three categories - sattvic, rajasic and tamasic - foods in the modes of goodness, passion and ignorance. Onions and garlic, and the other Alliums are classified as rajasic and to some extent tamasic, which means that they increase passion and to some degree ignorance.
> …
> Specifically, Vaisnavas do not like to cook with rajasic or tamasic foods because they are unfit to offer to the Deity.
>
> Rajasic and tamasic foods are also not used because they are detrimental to general health, meditation and devotions. Of course some of the Alliums have specific health benefits - garlic is respected as a natural antibiotic - but it is avoided because it stimulates the central nervous system and disturbs meditation.
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### Author:  [@Hippy\_Hollow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hippy_Hollow)
#### Post date: [November 13, 2010, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arrogant-clueless-store-owner-meets-brick-wall-of-reality-with-face/560527/23 "2010-11-13T18:43:23Z")
Reminds me of the Harry Enfield “I saw you coming” sketch.
The manager is a grade A jackass.
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### Author:  [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)
#### Post date: [November 13, 2010, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arrogant-clueless-store-owner-meets-brick-wall-of-reality-with-face/560527/24 "2010-11-13T18:51:09Z")
Do small groceries have a high infant mortality rate, or is that more a property of small restaurants? (Or am I off in the weeds and it’s a property of all small businesses, regardless of what they’re selling?)
Regardless of this wintry economic climate, being a jerk only sells if you can be a jerk like Steve Jobs or A-Rod. Orson Welles couldn’t manage to get his own way all the time, and if you don’ t know who he was _you’re_ the asshole; why should any grocer expect success?
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### Author:  [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)
#### Post date: [November 13, 2010, 7:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arrogant-clueless-store-owner-meets-brick-wall-of-reality-with-face/560527/25 "2010-11-13T19:22:14Z")
> [@VinylTurnip](#):
>
> $8 cartons of eggs? That’s actually pretty reasonable… for _Fabergé_.
If someone can show me a big difference between eight dollar eggs and two dollar eggs (I assume that’s a dozen price), I’ll consider them.
Do 8 dollar eggs come from different chickens?
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### Author:  [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)
#### Post date: [November 13, 2010, 7:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arrogant-clueless-store-owner-meets-brick-wall-of-reality-with-face/560527/26 "2010-11-13T19:22:15Z")
Dumb retailer loses his store, we’ve seen it before. I’m hijacking this joint.
> [@Fionn](#):
>
> Before reading the article, I pictured the store owner as someone who had run a neighborhood place for 50 years and struggled to avoid closure. The cranky twenty-something who was actually involved isn’t nearly as sympathetic.
Oh, so twenty-somethings don’t deserve to make a living?
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### Author:  [@drachillix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drachillix)
#### Post date: [November 13, 2010, 7:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arrogant-clueless-store-owner-meets-brick-wall-of-reality-with-face/560527/27 "2010-11-13T19:34:26Z")
> [@Isamu](#):
>
> Sounds like a pet-project that the owner set up for his fiance, who then ran it into the ground. Not uncommon.
I have tried to set several unemployed friends up with little micro businesses to get them some income. One is making a little cash at it, one crashed and burned and blames me for my poor advice.
Of course this is the same person who rarely answered the phone and insisted “people should leave messages and she will call them back” or would comment how unfair it was that they did not want to pay extra because the job site was like 7 miles away not 3. Even though we factored the maximum travel distance into her base charge.
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### Author:  [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)
#### Post date: [November 13, 2010, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arrogant-clueless-store-owner-meets-brick-wall-of-reality-with-face/560527/28 "2010-11-13T19:44:56Z")
> [@Musicat](#):
>
> If someone can show me a big difference between eight dollar eggs and two dollar eggs (I assume that’s a dozen price), I’ll consider them.
>
> Do 8 dollar eggs come from different chickens?
They were free-range eggs or something. Of course, what they don’t tell you is that free-range generally means the chickens do get to roam, but they also eat a bunch of crap (often literally) and are usually less healthy anyway. And even at that, 8$ a dozen eggs are still overpriced!
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### Author:  [@Peremensoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peremensoe)
#### Post date: [November 13, 2010, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arrogant-clueless-store-owner-meets-brick-wall-of-reality-with-face/560527/29 "2010-11-13T19:52:11Z")
“Free range” doesn’t have a strong standard of identity for commercial labeling. But _real_ free range chickens (with daily access to a real outdoor area, with grass and bugs and sunshine and everything) do produce the best eggs and the best meat. It’s a difference you can _see_ from the color of the yolks and the meat.
Also, such birds generally live their lives without any antibiotics; that’s a good thing, a more healthy bird. They do get standard immunizations.
Where I am, where people often keep hens, those eggs _are_ $2/dozen. In cities they might be twice that or more, but I can’t see how they could possibly be $8.
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### Author:  [@Ike\_Witt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ike_Witt)
#### Post date: [November 13, 2010, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arrogant-clueless-store-owner-meets-brick-wall-of-reality-with-face/560527/30 "2010-11-13T21:27:30Z")
> [@foolsguinea](#):
>
> Oh, so twenty-somethings don’t deserve to make a living?
Of course they do, but I am really curious as to what their business plan was:
1. Carry over priced items.
2. Don’t carry items people want.
3. Expect lots of repeat business.
4. ???
5. Profit!
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### Author:  [@Lobohan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobohan)
#### Post date: [November 13, 2010, 9:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arrogant-clueless-store-owner-meets-brick-wall-of-reality-with-face/560527/31 "2010-11-13T21:46:47Z")
> [@spark240](#):
>
> “Free range” doesn’t have a strong standard of identity for commercial labeling. But _real_ free range chickens (with daily access to a real outdoor area, with grass and bugs and sunshine and everything) do produce the best eggs and the best meat. It’s a difference you can _see_ from the color of the yolks and the meat.
I don’t know about that. The color of the yolks are dependent on the diet of the chicken. I used to keep chickens and their yolks were bright orange because of the particular feed we used. As for the meat, I have no information, since I never ate one of our chickens.
> [@](#):
>
> Also, such birds generally live their lives without any antibiotics; that’s a good thing, a more healthy bird. They do get standard immunizations.
If you have a lot of chickens you might need antibiotics sometimes, otherwise some disease can destroy your entire crop. It’s my understanding that using them is a matter of scale.
> [@](#):
>
> Where I am, where people often keep hens, those eggs _are_ $2/dozen. In cities they might be twice that or more, but I can’t see how they could possibly be $8.
I’m not defending $8 eggs, but some dude with a country house who has a few hens can get away with charging $2 for a dozen eggs, because it isn’t a real business, it’s an extra that comes from some pets. I assume actually having a real egg farm with a few hundred hens and having distribution and labor costs do deal with would increase the cost significantly.
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### Author:  [@Beware\_of\_Doug](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beware_of_Doug)
#### Post date: [November 13, 2010, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arrogant-clueless-store-owner-meets-brick-wall-of-reality-with-face/560527/32 "2010-11-13T21:50:09Z")
> [@fluiddruid](#):
>
> There was a lot of similar whining when an overpriced gourmet food store went out of business. It was, of course, because Des Moines isn’t sophisticated enough to support anything but the Wal-Marts and suchlike, not because of being overpriced and underwhelming.
>
> The actual problem was that they were in a ridiculously huge space, filled sparsely with overpriced products that were, in most cases, already available at local food stores at a significant savings. The unique and decently priced items did sell a lot – like their gelato – but not enough to cover the huge space (part of an expensive new development next to one of the largest malls in the country). They had a large area set aside for wine and spirits, but had inferior selection to main grocer in the area, and much higher prices. They were also directly opposite a Costco which carried a lot of their products at even deeper discounts. They had made poor decisions, like investing heavily in a chocolatier area when we already have a fantastic established local chocolatier with several locations throughout the area – and making an inferior product to theirs while charging about three times as much.
>
> I don’t miss them now that we have a Trader Joe’s. I also did extremely well for myself during their frantic final days of selling everything that wasn’t nailed down.
As a Central Iowan myself, fd, I strongly suspect our natural get-along-go-along conformity would have eliminated any Central Iowan with half a lick of business sense from ever trying something as culturally audacious as a gourmet market. Anyone with sense and audacity ends up in foreign places like Iowa City or Minneapolis as soon as they figure out the way of things. It takes a clueless screwup to try it in Des Moines.
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### Author:  [@FoieGrasIsEvil](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FoieGrasIsEvil)
#### Post date: [November 13, 2010, 9:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arrogant-clueless-store-owner-meets-brick-wall-of-reality-with-face/560527/33 "2010-11-13T21:56:03Z")
> [@spark240](#):
>
> See [here](http://connect.krishna.com/node/612) for a lengthy explanation from a Krishna. In part,
So by “disturbing meditation” what they really mean is that onions induce flatulence, causing outbreaks of laughter amongst the not-yet utterly brainwashed faithful?
😃
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### Author:  [@Hello\_Again](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hello_Again)
#### Post date: [November 13, 2010, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arrogant-clueless-store-owner-meets-brick-wall-of-reality-with-face/560527/34 "2010-11-13T22:03:57Z")
> [@Lobohan](#):
>
> I’m not defending $8 eggs, but some dude with a country house who has a few hens can get away with charging $2 for a dozen eggs, because it isn’t a real business, it’s an extra that comes from some pets. I assume actually having a real egg farm with a few hundred hens and having distribution and labor costs do deal with would increase the cost significantly.
There is no f-ing way eggs cost $8/doz in the Union Square Greenmarket in NYC, and NYC has both a higher cost of living and higher average wages than in Boston. You can get happy chicken eggs there – organic eggs from free-range hens that have been petted, told they are pretty, and had Chaucer read to them by moonlight – they don’t cost EIGHT freaking dollars. I think the highest I’ve seen is $4/doz. Most of those eggs come a considerable distance to market as well, between 2 and 6 hours drive.
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### Author:  [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)
#### Post date: [November 13, 2010, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arrogant-clueless-store-owner-meets-brick-wall-of-reality-with-face/560527/35 "2010-11-13T22:45:39Z")
Do they drive themselves?
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### Author:  [@Hello\_Again](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hello_Again)
#### Post date: [November 13, 2010, 10:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arrogant-clueless-store-owner-meets-brick-wall-of-reality-with-face/560527/36 "2010-11-13T22:48:10Z")
> [@Johnny\_L.A](#):
>
> Do they drive themselves?
They’re clever that way.
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### Author:  [@Hal\_Briston](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hal_Briston)
#### Post date: [November 13, 2010, 11:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arrogant-clueless-store-owner-meets-brick-wall-of-reality-with-face/560527/37 "2010-11-13T23:21:19Z")
> [@spark240](#):
>
> But _real_ free range chickens (with daily access to a real outdoor area, with grass and bugs and sunshine and everything) do produce the best eggs and the best meat. It’s a difference you can _see_ from the color of the yolks and the meat.
No doubt about that – my brother has a couple dozen chickens that spend their days roaming about his yard. The difference between the eggs I get from his place vs. the ones from the supermarket? Night and day. Nothing like an omelet made from eggs that had been inside a chicken a half-hour before.
However, no matter how tasty they are, they sure as hell ain’t worth eight bucks a dozen.
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### Author:  [@fluiddruid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fluiddruid)
#### Post date: [November 14, 2010, 12:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arrogant-clueless-store-owner-meets-brick-wall-of-reality-with-face/560527/38 "2010-11-14T00:11:18Z")
> [@Beware\_of\_Doug](#):
>
> As a Central Iowan myself, fd, I strongly suspect our natural get-along-go-along conformity would have eliminated any Central Iowan with half a lick of business sense from ever trying something as culturally audacious as a gourmet market. Anyone with sense and audacity ends up in foreign places like Iowa City or Minneapolis as soon as they figure out the way of things. It takes a clueless screwup to try it in Des Moines.
Eh, I don’t totally buy this. I just don’t think the boutique model works here; not enough stupid people with huge amounts of disposable income, and status symbols just aren’t measured that way in these parts. There are foodies here, though. Gateway Market on Ingersoll seems to be making it.
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### Author:  [@MsRobyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MsRobyn)
#### Post date: [November 14, 2010, 12:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arrogant-clueless-store-owner-meets-brick-wall-of-reality-with-face/560527/39 "2010-11-14T00:45:08Z")
> [@foolsguinea](#):
>
> Dumb retailer loses his store, we’ve seen it before. I’m hijacking this joint.Oh, so twenty-somethings don’t deserve to make a living?
Of course they deserve to make a living. They just can’t reasonably expect to make money hand over fist at a customer-oriented business while refusing to cater to customers’ wants.
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### Author:  [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)
#### Post date: [November 14, 2010, 1:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arrogant-clueless-store-owner-meets-brick-wall-of-reality-with-face/560527/40 "2010-11-14T01:01:08Z")
> [@MsRobyn](#):
>
> Of course they deserve to make a living. They just can’t reasonably expect to make money hand over fist at a customer-oriented business while refusing to cater to customers’ wants.
Id say that nobody deserves to make a living, at least not however they want. I don’t anyone starving, of course, but the world doesn’t owe anybody the acreer of their choice.
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