Lissa, granted it was annoying, but that cashier WAY overstepped his bounds.
KrapMart didn’t make us bring our pens, but customers still took the store ones. I found a polite, “Oh, could I have my pen back? Thanks!” with a friendly smile usually helped. Most of the time, people just took them without thinking about it.
If things didn’t happen the way they did, we’d be reading a story about a Home Depot security guard who go fired for not bringing the full weight of the law to bare on some old guy who mistakenly pocketed a pencil.
On Keith Oberman’s MSNBC show tomite, Home Depot or its security guy, got the 3rd Worst Person in the World Award.
What is wrong with that company?
Just to remind everyone how far things have gone in such a short time, I opened my general contracting business a scant 15 years ago in Bucks County, PA. There was no Home Despot, no Lowes-we had a Builder’s Square and a Hechinger but most contractors didn’t shop there. I went to a little hole-in-the-wall lumber yard that sold lumber and millwork. They gave us pencils and scratch pads. As a regular customer, I’d get a sweatshirt at Christmas time, and tee shirts in the summer. We were valued by the company and they showed it every time we walked through the door. The store mentioned in the OP is a pack of drooling idiots, IMO. They claim a whopping 41 cents value for the pencil-are they insane? Little independent putz like myself can buy them in bulk for around 15 cents each. HD’s cost is likely closer to a nickel. New. :rolleyes:
I’m wondering why, if they saw him pocket the pencil, didn’t someone simpy say “Hey, that’s a store pencil” at the time? Why didn’t his client say something?
Yet another reason for me to hate that aweful spot.
I have a confession to make. I was a serial pen thief. Back in the days when I worked in tourism and spent a lot of time helping clients check into hotels, I was appalled to find out how often a registration desk’s pens made it into my pocket. The only excuse I can offer was absent-mindedness. For what it’s worth, I think I also forgot a few pens at registration desks.
That said, this whole story does look pretty ridiculous. The customer who was treated so badly was a regular at the store and spent $170 on that trip alone. It was his customer who picked up the pencil and handed it to him. Mr. Panorelli, the man accused of theft, said he wasn’t even sure where his customer got the pencil from. Since security followed him around after he pocketed the pencil, they must have been aware that this wasn’t your common or garden shoplifter. It was Home Depot who threatened to sic lawyers on him and file a civil suit, which sounds ludicrous to me.
I’ve been in Home Depots and I know how huge there are and I can see how they wouldn’t know who their regular customers are. Then again, if I were in Mr. Panorelli’s shoes, even with the apology, I’d find somewhere else to take my business and I’d spread the word. Actually, if it were a store I owned, I would think it would be worth investing in a supply of pencils specifically for the use of customers and maybe even some small notepads so they can make notes about sizes, prices, and other options. I should be able to dig up some figures on how much customized pencils and notepads cost when bought in bulk. I’ve a feeling 41 cents is a bit high.
Whatever their reasoning, the management of this Home Depot has made a nasty mistake, and, if there’s economic justice, they’ll pay the appropriate price.
CJ
Indeed, they saved the cost of a pencil, and lost whatever profits they may have gotten from this contractor in the future. Granted, this was not a register pen used to sign receipts, but a item stocked for sale. That would technically make it shoplifting, but one would think that a “you absentmindedly pocketed a pencil, may I have it back?” would be a lot better than a “you shoplifted, go away and never come here again.”
Not to mention that every HD I’ve ever been to has those people checking off receipts to ensure you paid for everything in your cart. Why couldn’t they point out the extra pencil?
If I were the contractor, I’d stay away from that HD for sure, maybe taunt the manager in my free time with receipts from Lowes. I might go to other HD locations, given that corporate did apologize promptly.
I just bought a couple hundred pens printed with my business name for $0.40 each. There were price breaks at 500, 1000, 2000, and 5000 as well. IIRC it was about 28 cents each at the 5000pc mark.
So the moral here is, where you have a repeat customer who’s typically ringing up three- digit till receipts, don’t dick him around over two bits’ worth of pencil. Especially as I’m guessing it possibly cost a few dimes to pass around the red alert.
Eejits. :rolleyes:
Never have I seen such abuse of the “Take A Penny, Leave A Penny” Tray.
Was it? It seems unclear according to the article in the OP:
Was it “sitting next to a cash register for Panorelli to use” or was it that “the client picked up the pencil…for Panorelli to use” that was “sitting next to the cash register” for sale?
Bad writing, I say.
And also bad store managering.
Hope the carpenter never had a business where he can’t controll 100% of his employees actions.
Home Depot did the right thing. With upwards of 100,00 employees, reasonable people would consider a dumb employee move just a dumb employee move on.
In the end, the carpenter hursts himself by limiting his choices.
The infamous pencil appeared on local TV - it’s a carpenter’s pencil (wide and flat lead, not round), a type not normally found outside stores like, well, HD. It had the HD logo on it, too. HD sometimes has bins of them on the counter next to the register, on sale for $0.01. Yes, a literal abuse of the “Take a penny” jar.
I’d be very surprised if it was a “for sale” item. Pencils are not normally sold pre-sharpened.
Those pencils used to be free before the big box stores started charging. I remember seeing them there and thinking “They want money for those now?”. Now you can’t find them for free at the whole in the wall places anymore either.
You know, if I were doing marketing for Lowe’s, I’d totally do a campaign where they gave every customer a free pencil when the walked in the door. If nothing else, it’d be really, really funny.
I go one step further and recommend that if you’re in the market for a contractor, you shouldn’t hire anyone who does business with the big boxes (Lowes or Home Depot). They sell inferior products, their employees have limited product knowledge and even on compatible merchandise, any savings on price are eaten up by loss in time loading and unloading your merchandise.
According to this story, Barney Fife didn’t get fired over this.
I hate Home Despot. I refuse to shop there. The ads “you can do it, we can help” are guarenteed to make me scream “BULLSHIT” at the top of my lungs. The employees are completely clueless, and instead of finding out where the item you ask for is, they will send you on a wild goose chase around the store.
I hate that place.