I work in a retail shoe store as a cashier/sales associate, so yes, I work with customers. I quite often have to deal with people coming in with issues like:
1. Trying to return worn shoes "because they don't fit right". Our policy is no return on a worn pair of shoes unless it is damaged or not working properly. Fair enough, right? It's your responsibility to try it on and see if it works before walking outside on the street and scuffing it up, which means we can't resell it and have to send it out as a damage.
2. Flipping their lid over things like expired certificates and offers. First off, this is free money given to customers regardless of what the rewards program says. Rewards certificates are different since they are something we give to members for being loyal to the company by giving us their business.
The offers, however, are a little different. They are sent out randomly based on how customers shop with us, and these ones do have an expiration date that we're more strict about considering the computer won't read it as valid anyway. People tend to flip out because of these things for two reasons: (1) If a customer uses an offer on a purchase and decides to return it, they don't get that offer back. Why? Because it's free money they didn't earn. They can, however, have it transferred to another item if they do an exchange, which is nice because sometimes you can find a different shoe for the same price and have it just be a straight up exchange.
The (2nd) reason customers get upset about expired offers is just that: we rarely accept them, unless it looks like the customer is going to pitch a hissy fit. This is why I don't like dealing with customers regarding certificates/offers. They act self entitled, as if they're being robbed of money they never earned in the first place. In fact, I had a woman accuse me of stealing her money because I told her the return policy for returns/exchanges. In that example, actually, the reason she got the money off was because we were doing a tiered offer for all rewards members on any purchase over three specified amounts (ie $10 off $30, $20 off $60, etc) Again, rewards is a little different, but I'm mostly referring to offers.
3. Not carrying many different sizes or certain brands. We aren't a large store. We're the biggest one in the state, but we're not as big as the ones in LA or NY. That means that we don't carry everything on the website in the store. And with each box, we get about 1-2 sizes of each style of shoe they send us. If that shoe is selling well, we get replenishment of it. We can also find it online and ship (for free for rewards members), or find it nearby.
People, however, come into the store quite often complaining we don't have their size, which is understandable. I am not in charge of handling the shipments, though. I don't make the decision to stock a certain amount of sizes or brands, but I do get the brunt of the customer complaints when it becomes an issue. Here's the great part. Many of our customers often confess and say they've waited until the last minute to shop for shoes.
Here's the thing: retail is about a month or two ahead on the calendar year in terms of seasons. In mid-July/August, we already received lots of boot shipments. This isn't a new thing, and it certainly won't change in the future. In fact, if things continue on the trend they're going, chances are you'll see stuff in stores earlier than usual. If you've ever shopped in a store, you may have heard about this so don't act too surprised! Plus, it isn't my fault the customer waited until the last minute to find something they should have been looking for at least a week prior. I had a woman come into the store today to look for a pair of shoes for her sister's wedding. She was looking for sandals, and, believe it or not, since we're coming into the end of the summer season, there weren't any more of her size available in the store. She wasn't upset, which was nice, but she did have to go a half-size smaller.
Anyway, that's all I can think of for now and I have to go to dinner anyway. I'll come back and add more later!
runk:
