I’ve been considering this exact strategy; I’ll employ it from now on.
Thanks!
If a business uses an American Flag (I’m in the USA, of course) in their advertising and on a pole in front of their store, I do not assume it is because the owners are so patriotic. I think they are just trying to make their store look better by flying the flag. If that flag begins to look the least bit ratty, they can no longer expect my custom and I will report them to the Vets and Legion.
On the other hand, if they have a place where they display all the trophies won by the athletic teams of adults and kids they sponsor, they can expect me to be appreciative.
I’ve noticed, on the music thing, that while the employees who come in early like to listen to pretty loud music while they are setting up, if you are the first customer in the door, they will always turn the music down when you ask. the choice of music? Even country, if played not too loudly, can be ignored after a few minutes.
Anyone in business, contractor or store, should keep their politics a secret. No sense losing half your potential customers without trying. Even donations from your business or a personal donations by a person who has their name on a business should be anonymous, particularly if they are political donations. No one will complain if you make a big check to the United Fund, etc., but political parties? don’t make enemies unnecessarily if you are in business. Customers are hard enough to keep.
crucible, your comments are some of the best so far!
I totally agree about the flag thing, I’ve contacted businesses about their flags before, when they got worn. I also started patronizing a certain grocery store over it’s flag. Two reasons, they were in the strip mall I worked, and convenient. The other is what I saw one day when an unexpected downpur occured. The manager of the store went rushing out to take down the flag, so it wouldn’t be rained on!!! This place, I also discovered, put it up at dawn and took it down at sunset, as they didn’t have a spotlight.
Same here.
I quit going to a restaurant that I ate at a lot after they installed a big TV blaring Fox News.
I quit going to a restaurant because the bartenders use the glass to scoop ice, even after I told then not too.
I quit stopping by a nearby 7-11 for my morning coffee because this same guy (customer) was always loitering near the counter, talking with the cashier and trying to make small talk with each customer. Incredibly annoying.
And I haven’t been inside a Radio Shack in years 'cause they require everything short of a semen specimen to purchase a pack of batteries.
mmm
Local pizzeria near my work I use to frequent. I became pretty chatty with the owner he would give me free drinks on occasion, larger portions. He would sit and chat with me at times talking about every thing. Very friendly all around likeable guy, then he mentioned that I should go out with him and some friends one night pick up some women. He’s married.
Yeah, I’ll pass on that and extra fries thanks.
Jeeezus.
When I was a bartender we used a metal scoop, and if a glass broke anywhere near the open ice box. The ice was dumped out, hot water poured through and wiped down for broken glass. Didn’t matter how busy it was.
Did you inform management about this ?
I won’t go into the local barber anymore. You used to come into the place and they’d ask for your first name to put on a list of who was next. Now they require people to give their full information like first and last name, address, phone number. No thanks.
Ugh. This. This. THIS!!!
Not just loud music, but also TVs blaring. Who thinks this is a good idea? What’s wrong with a little quiet? Or just a reasonable volume allowing conversation?
I complained at one place and the owner said I shouldn’t have sat at a table near the speaker. Never mind that we were seated there by his waitress, it was apparently our fault and completely out of line to ask that we be able to speak to the person sitting next to us.
Agreed on all counts. A couple years ago, I was new to an area and needed some prescription cat food, so I picked a veterinarian out of the phone book. He had militia magazines in his waiting room. :eek: Nope, didn’t go back there either.
There was a chain of pizza restaurants in my area that were very popular with families with young children, because they had an arcade and an play area, and unlike Chuck E. Cheese also had good pizza, so people of all ages patronized it. One day last year, the employees all showed up for work, and the door was locked and there was a sign on the door stating that the whole company had shut down. It turned out that embezzlement was a big reason why the company folded, and the employees, many of them minimum-wage workers with dependents, later had a lot of difficulty getting their final paychecks, and probably received them only because of all the bad publicity.
You guessed it - they had a fish on the door. :rolleyes:
I’d be SOL if I went to that store, because they wouldn’t be able to get a semen specimen from me.
OT: Several years ago, I stopped by the 4-H booth at the county fair, and one exhibit was about horses and said “Mares may produce semen…”
:smack:
…I stopped going to this one Toys R Us because every time I walked in the door my stomach would start rumbling and I’d have to run to the washroom. I have no idea why my body associates that store with GOTTA GO RIGHT NOW but it’s pretty annoying.
I was all set to buy some stuff at a medical supply store, when the owner tapped a poster and mentioned that they sold Herbalife, and did I want to try the snake oil that was on special. I suddenly remembered that my husband had mentioned that he needed to get the car fixed, so I couldn’t buy those supplies today until I put more money in the account, and I scooted out of there.
You can’t just leave us there. We need the rest of the story.
There’s a used bookstore in Chicago that I’d visit more often, but the owner has the annoying habit of commenting on all of my purchases. I’m fine with bookstore owner noticing that I"m buying Sci Fi and mentioning that they have a monthly sale on the first Saturday of the month or mentioning that they have a better copy of the book I’m buying for the same price. I’m even fine with the occasional, “The first 100 pages can be a chore to get through, but it is worthwhile to stick it out, the rest of the book is great.” type of comments.
I remember one time I was buying a copy of Profile In Courage by John Kennedy to replace a long departed copy I had in college. The owner seemed to want to tell me everything that was wrong with the Kennedy family as well as every single Kennedy conspiracy theory.
The small city where I used to live (40K population in the rural Midwest) had a natural foods store that was very successful for many years, and after the ownership changed, the store declined rapidly, mainly because in addition to the building having a sewer line leak that for some reason wasn’t fixed (they shared a building with a laundromat), the owner tried to sell everyone colon cleanses and was a practitioner of Eckankar. How do I know the last thing? She had Eckankar posters all over the store, and literature available at the register.
Some of us wondered if the colon cleanse thing was the origin of the foul smell.
For my last new car, I got the first few oil changes from the dealer, at a very competitive price. But 2 days after each oil change, we would get a phone call from the (very elderly) owner, thanking us for our patronage and asking if everything went OK. Great - except like many older people, she got up very early and those calls invariably woke up the whole house.
I started going elsewhere, since the $2 price difference was well worth not getting those calls.
I stopped going to a local Braum’s Ice Cream shop because of horrifying service. One time. It was some afternoon I walked in for a frozen yogurt cone. Kind of busy, but, plenty of help.
Young hot babe (looking at everybody in the store except for me): Can I help you?
hh: Yes, blah, blah…
Yhb: OK…(looks around like she just realized where she was)…I’m sorry, it’ll be just a minute…
hh: Uh, OK…
Yhb walks off…talks to somebody at other station…somebody else asks me if I’m being helped. I said that I was. Yhb comes back.
Yhb: Can I help you?
hh (understanding that to Yhbs, anybody without a pierced tongue doesn’t even register on their life meters): Sure, I’ll have a blah, blah…
Yhb: OK…
hh: stands there like an idiot, for about 3 minutes, while Yhb does everything except even look at the cones
I finally realized that this girl was an effing idiot, and if the manager hadn’t had the sense to not hire her, he didn’t have the sense to keep from rubbing his genitals all over the dairy products, so I shouldn’t be in the store.
I have used the other Braum’s stores around. During busy times, at the other stores, I can be equally as frustrated, but, try as I might, I cannot bring myself to go into this one particular store.
Just yesterday, I went into Sears for a spark plug. They wanted my phone number. I was too numb from the heat to object, and I, robot like, gave it to them. Then, they wanted my fucking email address. I could only look at them, and shake my head. I’m pretty tired of the phone number for a spark plug, but, I’m still hooked on Craftsman, and I put up with the phone number crap to help keep them in business. For now.