In my house I have more DVD’s then places to put them. My current shelf is a very nice piece of furniture my wife’s father made – but it only holds about 200 DVD. I’ve got around 450 now. My entire “Twilight Zone” collection (46 discs) have to sit in a box in storage. Sad really.
The simple solution to the problem would be to buy a new DVD shelf.
I’ve spent a bit of time looking around but have yet to find something I like. Most are either cheaply made, ugly, or both. I decided to buy something cheap to get by until I find just the right piece of furniture to house my growing collection.
I noticed in the paper there was a particular office supply store offering a DVD shelf for $19.99 (I won’t tell you the name of the store, but for the sake of the story we’ll call them Orifice Max). The shelves were standard run of the mill particle board covered in black plastic-like material. I figured two of these, one on either side of the television, would fit the bill and not look too bad.
Like most trips to a store the plan is often simple. Go in, get item, pay, leave. The only other time I expect something different is when I visit a salesman store where you’ll be cornered into buying some “protection plan” scam or a place like Radio Shack where nobody knows anything.
The first part of my “buying an item” plan was working quite nicely. I managed to enter the store without too much difficulty. The second part of the plan was coming together as well. I did have to wander around the store a bit to see if there was another item I needed/wanted and I wasn’t quite sure where the target item was kept. Without too much fumbling I located the item and quickly snatched the last two from the display.
My plan is starting to take shape. Soon I’ll be home unpacking volumes of Twilight Zone episodes and deciding if I should arrange my B-movie sci-fi collection alphabetically by title, actor, director or tossing logic to the wind and arranging the movies aesthetically (all blue covers together, all green covers together, etc)
I haul my cheap DVD shelves to the counter and stand behind two old ladies buying, what looks to be, back to school supplies.
I wait.
And I wait.
And I wait.
How long is this going to take? It’s been 10 minutes already. Oh no! Not a pencil price check! This could take hours.
Then I spot the next aisle over. The check out person is handing a receipt to the customer and there is no one behind them. Quick! To the BatCart! Right up to the check out girl I go. (whew, that was a close one)
She looks like she doesn’t want to be in the store today. We have something in common because I don’t want to be shopping today. I’d much rather be at home meticulously arranging 54 Mystery Science Theater DVD’s by air date.
She scans the first shelf bleep. Oh, I think. We’re more then half way there. bleep goes the second. WHOO-HOO! And then, it happened.
“Would you like to purchase our assurance plan?”
<Kyle Broslofski’s Mom> What! What? WHAT!?! </Kyle Broslofski’s Mom>
Oh no. We were doing so well.
I think I should point out that I dislike performance/extended warrenty/assurance plans of any sort. Perhaps dislike is too strong a word. How about “Fucking HATE”?
I would never buy one on a computer, printer or television. Even offering one to me says you don’t trust the product you’re selling will perform well enough to make your customer happy OR you know it will function just fine and I will have no need to use said plan. Either way it is a terrible way to start a customer/client relationship. I also hate how when I say no, it doesn’t mean no. The salesman will often go into detail how I’m a total idiot if I choose to not buy the plan. How my item will fail and I’ll be stuck holding a broken, worthless thing with nothing left to do but break down and cry in the shower like I’m in a made for TV movie.
That aside, this is a shelf designed to hold DVD’s. There are no moving parts to break, no electronics to go bad, no CRT to implode. It’s a shelf! I need some form of “assurance” it will perform as a shelf? This “assurance” is going to cost me extra? It’s a 20 fucking dollar shelf!
I’m sure there are lots of things I could have said. “Please tell me more” or “no thank you”. The Terminator display behind my eyes went through the various possible responses, weighed the effectiveness of each and halted at the fifth on the list…
“You’re kidding right?”
Oh, wrong answer.
The girl slowly raised her eyes from the register, shifted the weight of her body to the other leg, tilted her head slightly to the left and said “No…… I’m not.”
She might have well said “Look fucker. They make me sell this shit. I don’t like it either but it’s part of my job. But, because you’ve taken that tone with me I will fuck with you right back. I will move as slow as I can and make you suffer the wrath of Tina, the Destroyer of shelf buyers.”
Of course I could have taken that as a hint to let it go, but I’m an idiot.
“This is a cheap twenty dollar shelf,. designed to hold DVD’s,. what could go wrong?”
This kicked her into “you asked for it” mode. She started her memorized sales speech handed down from the whoever-manager on how to convince people to buy into this scam. She also decided to recite it at snails pace speed.
I had to save the both of us.
“I don’t want it. I just want to buy the shelves.”
But she’s not letting me off the hook that easy.
“Do you need any paper or pens or pencils today?”
Oh, I see. This is how the game is played. Well my dear lady, two can play at this game. I slowly raised my eyes from my wallet, shifted the weight of my body to the other leg, tilted my head slightly to the left and said “No…… I don’t. I… Just…Want… The… Shelves”
What started as a simple 4 step plan has turned into a battle of wits. Cold, disinterested checkout girl forced into a sales role versus shelf buying customer dead set on getting out of the store quickly. She was a fucking Jedi master though.
With the tone of a coroner removing the spleen from a 2 week dead burn victim “We have lined paper on sale today for 99 cents”
Damn she’s good. I thought of waving my hand in front of her and saying “he doesn’t need any lined paper. This isn’t the droid you’re looking for” – but instead I pointed at the credit card terminal and said “this is where I scan my credit card right?”
At first I thought Checkmate.
I zip the card through and place it back in my wallet and sign the terminal. She hits a few buttons and prints a receipt.
With an exhale she says “I need to see your ID”
Feeling cocky I say “Of course”. I flip my wallet open and show her my ID through the window in the wallet. She looks at it and then asks to see the credit card. I hand her the card.
“Please take your ID out of the wallet and hand it to me.”
Oh no she didn’t! This has turned from a battle of wits into just playing dirty. I just want to buy my shelves and go home. That’s it. I’m done playing.
“No!” (Ah ha. Weren’t expecting that one were you?)
I continue “I just wanted to buy two DVD shelves. I didn’t want to be upsold. I didn’t want any hassle. I just wanted two shelves. 40 bucks from me to you and I walk out the door. Forget it. Cancel the sale.”
Now, I might have been an asshole. I’ll admit that. But if I go buy eggs I don’t want someone being forced into the situation of pushing a pound of hamburger on me. I don’t like it and the check out person doesn’t like doing it. Under normal situations if someone offers me an extended warranty and they don’t take “no” as an answer, I walk out of the store and buy it elsewhere. I’m not going to be pestered by a company trying to squeeze every last dime out of my pocket.
I make her run a refund on the card and walk over to the customer service desk. I get the manager over and lay into him.
“I came in to buy a couple of shelves. 40 bucks. Nothing much. A small sale I know. But I do not like being up sold. Paper, pens, whatever. I REALLY don’t want to spend ten extra dollars on a 40 dollar sale for two stupid, cheap DVD shelves. I don’t like being asked if I want this extra crap. I can drive 3 blocks down the street to another store where I know the service will be fine and I won’t be up sold. And, next time, that’s just what I’m going to do. Today you lost a 40 dollar sale because of what the company insists on having the checkout people say, but you also lost future sales to me because now I know this store has degraded like so many others. Pinch the customer for every little penny you can. Forget it, I’m not playing. I won’t be returning.”
I walked out.
Fuck um.
