Wingnuts and Customer Service

With a carpenter husband, I don't often visit the hardware store....at least not alone.

Now I'll try not to rant, but frankly, my recent experience was absolutely ridiculous.

I went in to buy two precut pieces of wood, four bolts, washers, wingnuts, and a handle (I'll explain their purpose in another post) My trip to the store occurred at about 6:30 p.m. The store was virtually empty, but the shelves contained many mysteries.

Off I went in search of someone to help me on my mission. After wandering the store for about 10 minutes I began to wonder if the clerks were scurrying to other aisles as they sensed my approach. Finally I found someone. He told me that I needed to go to the "Lumber" desk and the guys there would help me out. Oh, and he also told me to have a great night.

I won't get into too many details, but basically I felt like I was living out a bad phone call being shifted from one department to another and back again. Then I also had the two sales people waiting on one customer...talking about football.

After 45 minutes in the store I left in disgust, without my purchase. I trudged through the blowing snow cursing the store, the clerks and my 'bad' luck at having a carpenter husband. By the time I got to my car I was angry with myself. When had my lack of knowledge ever stopped me from doing anything like this before. This was how I learned things....although the service was painful.

I marched back into the store and asked to speak to the manager. I was ticked off at the service and decided to let them know. (not a usual step for me) The manager was convincingly contrite, offerring to help me with my purchase. 10 minutes later I was walking out of the store.

So, what the heck did this experience teach me? Next time I go shopping in a place like that, I may bring my husband. I'm also going to ask lots of questions, though, and I'm not going to let some huge hardware store frighten me away. I may have felt like some poor guy in a lingerie shop, but I shall prevail.

 

By the way, wingnuts are not that common anymore...but I found the ones I needed!