Retail Life Episode 5


Couponers.

I’m all for saving money, but some of these people take it to a ridiculous extreme. Sure, it’s cool when you can get some things for free with coupons and sales and all that. But, would you please explain to me why you need seven toothbrushes, ten different body washes, and five different laundry soaps. And it’s not just a stocking up situation, because I’ll probably see them in the store the following week doing it all again.

I’ve had one customer tell me why she does it, and I understand her situation. She sends it all to her family in Mexico. She feels better about sending stuff rather than money because she knows some of her family members wouldn’t use the money for good. Okay, sure, this makes sense.

But I also see facebook pages selling the items they got for cheap or free. Pictures of the soaps and shampoos lined up in their garage. Ridiculous.

And there are so many people that will argue over the coupons because they’re trying to abuse the system. They are ready with a million different excuses on why you should take their coupon.

“Well if it scans, it works.”

“It’s coded for these items, even if they’re not listed.”

And my all-time favorite, “The other store let me use it.”  Then go back to that store!

Here’s a story that goes more into the coupon abuse that I experience daily.

 

On top of that coupon nonsense, we now have an app with coupons for our stores. *Eye roll* and we have to put up signs advertising the possible discounts. Which is great, if people actuallly read signs. But of course all they see is the $1.95 final price at the bottom and think they can clear out my shelf of $5 laundry soap for that price. When I politely explain to them it doesn’t work that way, suddenly I’m a monster and our store is the worst and false advertising and blah blah blah.

Customers are now going on tirades about how unfair it is to offer coupons on an app but not have them in the store. “Not everyone understands technology!” Sure. Except I’ve explained the app to an 80 year old woman and she’s got it down every time she comes in the store. So if she can do it, so can you. Don’t come up to my register yelling about how it’s too complicated and you just can’t get it to work.

And then this particular customer experience that just makes me want to smack someone.

One of my assistants is super nice. He has great customer service 100% of the time, even when someone is yelling at him. He is always trying to make the customer happy in any way he can. So this customer tells him she can’t get the app to work, but she knows there’s a $5 off coupon on there right now. He tells her he isn’t going to use his, so he types in his number and lets her use his coupson.

*Face palm*

So now every time she comes in the store, she expects one of us to give her our coupons. Which would be fine if she only shopped when he was there. But she doesn’t. I was ringing her up and she did a half ass attempt to get her app to work, then said “can’t you just give me your coupons?” When I say no because I use my coupons, she gets mad and yells about how “that other guy is so much nicer.” She steps out of line for a minute and when she comes back through, her coupons magically load off the app.

She comes back in last week. We do not have a $5 off coupon available on the app right now. However, there was a flyer that was MAILED OUT to people with five different coupons, one being the $5 off. So she’s shopping, comes up to the register, and halfway through me ringing her up she asks if we have a coupon right now. I tell her about the flyer and ask if she received one and brought it in. Of course she forgot it at home. But up to this point, she’s being friendly. She asks if I can just hold her stuff and she’ll run home and get it. Sure thing. No problem.

Five minutes later she’s back, and she’s mad. Becuase I guess she missplaced her coupon flyer. And now it’s all my fault and why isn’t there one on the app? Why don’t I just have one in the store? It’s not fair. She should just get the discount. She’s in here all the time. And where is that other guy? He is just so much more helpful. Blah blah blah.

She buys her stuff and on the way out asks my favorite question

“And what’s your name?”