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I'm probably slipping into geezer mode in raising the subject, but I sometimes wonder why, exactly, shopping has become so relentlessly unpleasant?
God knows I love to spend me some money, but at so many retail outlets nowadays, it's become such an unpleasant undertaking.
I visited the storied Barney's Warehouse Sale today. Barney's, of course, is the sort of chi-chi department store whose wares I usually can't afford, but twice a year they mount a warehouse sale that has become legendary among New York's hoi polloi. The sale gives Gotham groundlings like me the opportunity to dress far more stylishly than one's budget (or penny-pinching ways, as the case may be) would normally allow.
That said, I don't generally stop by the sale -- once every few years seems to suit my purposes. It can be a madhouse, and, as is so often the case with these events, merchandise is offered that seems unlikely to have ever spent any time on an actual Barney's rack or shelf.
I went in search of black leather shoes for everyday wear, and I found a pair I liked well enough (and at a price reasonable enough) to convince me to take the plunge.
And here's where the shopping experience took a nosedive.
I walked, shoebox in hand, through the men's department, up the stairs, and through the women's department toward the cashiers. When I was no more than ten feet from the check-out queue, I was stopped by an employee. He opened the box and rifled through it, looking each shoe over carefully, inside and out (I'm not entirely sure what he thought I might have stashed in them -- my feet are only size 9) and then tied the box with thick nylon twine. It took him some time to accomplish this task.
I wondered why this procedure was necessary, but decided (naive soul that I am) that it must be meant to be some kind of convenience for the customer. I then walked the few feet from his station to the entrance to the check-out line, relieved that only a couple of patrons were in front of me. I would quickly be on my way, or so I expected.
However, when I reached the front of the line, another employee asked me for my name and address.
"Why do you need that info?" I asked, annoyed that the checkout process was threatening to take longer than I had spent picking out the shoes.
"It's to enable you to check out," he said, not a little flustered that I had questioned him.
I almost challenged him on this absurd bit of double-talk, but I was on my lunch hour and needed to complete the purchase as quickly as possible and get back to the office. So, with a pronounced sigh, I gave him the requested data (for that is exactly what it was, I knew) and accepted the now-completed personal info card from him. I noted that he'd left the email line blank; I think my obvious disapproval may have dissuaded him from asking for that.
When finally I was afforded access to a cashier, she struggled mightily to input the information from my info card into her computer (somehow, "Bratt" didn't strike her as an unlikely first name until I corrected her spelling). As she was endeavoring to finalize the data mining, her colleague cut the twine off the box and inspected the shoes just as thoroughly as the man who secured the twine around the box had done.
The twine, which was obviously meant not as a customer convenience but as some kind of ill-conceived security measure, had been on the box for no more than four minutes, during which time I had traveled a distance of no more than fifteen feet.
The whole exercise was a pointless intrusion.
I fully understand that shoplifting is a problem, but I can't help but wonder if more money is not lost in offending law-abiding patrons with security practices that inconvenience and intrude than is ever lost to thieves.
Barney's is hardly alone in this practice. The Best Buy in my neighborhood has, from day one, performed bag checks as paying customers exit the store. The unspoken, perhaps unintended, but undeniable message is this: "Yes, we understand that you've spent your hard-earned money in our store today, but we're going to subject you to intrusive scrutiny to ensure that you're not also attempting to steal from us."
Or, to put another way: Even paying customers are guilty until proven innocent.
I'm sure shoplifters are occasionally foiled with these methods, people who buy a cheap item and stash an more expensive piece of merchandise in the bag in hopes of getting it for free.
But I'm betting the number of people these security tactics irritate, offend, and alienate is much greater.
Further, I wonder if such stores wouldn't come out further ahead by having more staff on hand rather than resorting to tying twine around shoe boxes and searching bags. That way, more employees would be able to assist legitimate customers (let's face it, it's not always easy to find someone who can answer questions in these impersonal, big-box stores) while keeping an eye out for pilferage.
I'm not so old, really, but I can remember a time when clerks in a retail store were deferential and accomodating. It's a pretty rare store that offers that kind of service today.
Though, now that I think about it, I'll bet Barney's employees don't tie shoeboxes with twine at their tony flagship store in midtown Manhattan; they likely don't perform bag searches, either. Let's face it -- at those prices, they can't afford to alienate their patrons. It's only we bargain hunters who have to grin and bear such affronts.
Posted by brett at 05:32 PM | TrackBack