If you sell it, we will buy.
Sep. 5th, 2010 07:45 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
captainsblogIf it hasn't been clear from my past posts, or perhaps Eleanor's, "shop" is far more of a four-letter word to me than its more controversial Carlinesque cousin. I liken the process to Chinese bamboo torture, only with more hideous background music. I don't mind "shopping for" an item in the sense of picking/pricing it out, preferably from behind this desk; and once I'm at a register with the item(s) in hand, I enjoy engaging the cashier in conversation and helping with the payment and other checkout processes as much as I can. It's the in-between of those, particularly the findings of items in unfamiliar venues and, worse, the frustration when something can't be found, that can leave me flummoxed and frustrated.
You might think it's gotten better now that we have all these Tech-Knuckle Toolz to help locate products, before or during the store visits. Yeah, they work great, but only as well as the quantities the sellers are allowed to sell. What is making this so much of a Great Recession (a term I've read many times in recent days and which seems to fit) is the sheer stonewalling going on by retailers to limit their exposures to further downturns by stocking the absolute minimum of inventory, thereby self-fulfilling the naysayers' prophecies about customers being reluctant to buy.
The customers are there, people. Trust me; I saw a mob of people going in and out of a Christmas store in late July, and my turns in three stores this afternoon were packed with would-be buyers. Yet everywhere I was headed, the product was nowhere to be found.
I'll cut my recap of Round One, because it involved two stores (Lowes and Tarjay) and the quest for a dorm refrigerator for Emily. Yes, she reported this morning: she'd figured out that she wanted one, had room for one, and we had no problem getting her one.
No problem in theory, anyway.
Eleanor found a small (2.5 cubic liter) unit at Wally World. I checked some online sites and found one that was a bit smaller (it's gonna be a tight fit) and a few dollars less expensive at Lowe's, so I picked their outlet on the Boulevard that had some other options nearby if I struck out.
Which I did, on no pitches. Nothing in there was close to what their website showed; the next highest-up model was nearly twice the price and likely wouldn't have fit. I showed the "appliance help center" person the online data, and was told, basically, nope, Frigidaire doesn't live here anymore. It was a "special purchase" for back-to-school, and late-arriving colleges like RIT be damned, no more would be coming in.
But check across the car park, she said. Target has a whole back-to-college section.
Indeed they do. I found space on the shelves for an Emerson unit, slightly bigger than the phantom Lowe's model, and even a few bucks cheaper. Also gone, and also not coming back to that or any B-lo store. I waited until I got home and decided to check their Rochester outlets, and found one with "limited availability." That turned out to be eight units- five blue and three pink- but, because they were also clearance items, they couldn't set one aside for me. "Fine," I replied, "I'll buy it. Right now. Sight unseen."
The Tarjay don't work that way, I'm afraid. Best I could do was get them to agree to hold it for 24 hours- which, because of the holiday tomorrow, means that I have to wait until 9 or 10 tomorrow morning and call again, hoping there's not a late Sunday night rush on the things. Assuming there isn't, I can then pick one up on my way to some downtown work and before heading south/east for some brief Finger Lakes-ish stops.
----
Such indifference is not all that unexpected in the not-so-major appliance departments of various big boxes. I get more frustrated, though, when I find it coming from the bookstore end of the world.
Our church's book club selections for the fall are out, and I'm likely to be 3-for-3 with them. November's will be The Help, a troubling but beautiful novel by a friend of Joss named Kathryn Stockett, which we've already purchased. December brings the latest from Empire Falls author Richard Russo, which I haven't heard much about yet but will plunge into on general reputation. The first book, though, a month from now, came as another pleasant surprise: a sequel to Three Cups of Tea, which I have deep and slightly personal connections to, this one solely under the authorship of the man behind it all, Greg Mortenson. His story is so important, UB has invited him as part of their annual Distinguished Speakers Series- which has brought, or will bring, the likes of Arianna Huffington, Jon Stewart and the Dalai Lama to Amherst- and Greg's story will likely fill Alumni Arena on the night after my birthday in November. (Info about that here- let me know if you want to go with the book club, as we're going to get a set of tickets as a group.)
Having just finished my last August book-read, and our libraries being closed until Tuesday, I set out to Barnes & Noble for a copy of this worthwhile and important work. And,.... nothing. Not on the "new non-fiction" table, not next to the several copies of Three Cups they still carried.
Fortunately, I've always found their customer service desk to be helpful. These days, less so. Between their merciless pimping of their Nook readers and the dozens of copies you had to push past of the just-published memoir by Jill Kelly (wife of the Hall of Fame Bills quarterback and therefore in the local pantheon of sainthood), they didn't seem much interested in anything else. Finally, they found the one copy of Greg's Stones into Schools they had on premise, and placed it in my hands.
As I cashed out, I mentioned that it was the last copy, and that they probably should check their inventory; It's a popular book club selection, plus UB is bringing him to campus in November and there's going to be a demand for it. (Did I mention that this particular BN branch is within a walk of UB's campus- a difficult one perhaps, but certainly nothing for Greg, or even me back when I was a law student?)
I might as well have said to her that "the capital of South Dakota is Pierre." An interesting fact, perhaps, but one that meant nothing to her. Did I want my receipt in the bag, and did I want to see how to use a Nook reader? Have a nice day.
I'd have had a much nicer one, Jennifer S., if I had more of a sense that you cared about the words you sell as much as I care about them as a buyer.
Just as I'd had such an experience with an indy store recently, this one at the Big Book Box level left me cold. When Amazon's UK subsidiary can get a brand-new copy of an England-only DVD into my hands, by regular post/mail, four days after its release, I need a reason to shlep out in my car, to your bricks and your mortar, to make the time and effort worth my while, even just a little. This, I'm sad to say, was not that.
You might think it's gotten better now that we have all these Tech-Knuckle Toolz to help locate products, before or during the store visits. Yeah, they work great, but only as well as the quantities the sellers are allowed to sell. What is making this so much of a Great Recession (a term I've read many times in recent days and which seems to fit) is the sheer stonewalling going on by retailers to limit their exposures to further downturns by stocking the absolute minimum of inventory, thereby self-fulfilling the naysayers' prophecies about customers being reluctant to buy.
The customers are there, people. Trust me; I saw a mob of people going in and out of a Christmas store in late July, and my turns in three stores this afternoon were packed with would-be buyers. Yet everywhere I was headed, the product was nowhere to be found.
I'll cut my recap of Round One, because it involved two stores (Lowes and Tarjay) and the quest for a dorm refrigerator for Emily. Yes, she reported this morning: she'd figured out that she wanted one, had room for one, and we had no problem getting her one.
No problem in theory, anyway.
Eleanor found a small (2.5 cubic liter) unit at Wally World. I checked some online sites and found one that was a bit smaller (it's gonna be a tight fit) and a few dollars less expensive at Lowe's, so I picked their outlet on the Boulevard that had some other options nearby if I struck out.
Which I did, on no pitches. Nothing in there was close to what their website showed; the next highest-up model was nearly twice the price and likely wouldn't have fit. I showed the "appliance help center" person the online data, and was told, basically, nope, Frigidaire doesn't live here anymore. It was a "special purchase" for back-to-school, and late-arriving colleges like RIT be damned, no more would be coming in.
But check across the car park, she said. Target has a whole back-to-college section.
Indeed they do. I found space on the shelves for an Emerson unit, slightly bigger than the phantom Lowe's model, and even a few bucks cheaper. Also gone, and also not coming back to that or any B-lo store. I waited until I got home and decided to check their Rochester outlets, and found one with "limited availability." That turned out to be eight units- five blue and three pink- but, because they were also clearance items, they couldn't set one aside for me. "Fine," I replied, "I'll buy it. Right now. Sight unseen."
The Tarjay don't work that way, I'm afraid. Best I could do was get them to agree to hold it for 24 hours- which, because of the holiday tomorrow, means that I have to wait until 9 or 10 tomorrow morning and call again, hoping there's not a late Sunday night rush on the things. Assuming there isn't, I can then pick one up on my way to some downtown work and before heading south/east for some brief Finger Lakes-ish stops.
----
Such indifference is not all that unexpected in the not-so-major appliance departments of various big boxes. I get more frustrated, though, when I find it coming from the bookstore end of the world.
Our church's book club selections for the fall are out, and I'm likely to be 3-for-3 with them. November's will be The Help, a troubling but beautiful novel by a friend of Joss named Kathryn Stockett, which we've already purchased. December brings the latest from Empire Falls author Richard Russo, which I haven't heard much about yet but will plunge into on general reputation. The first book, though, a month from now, came as another pleasant surprise: a sequel to Three Cups of Tea, which I have deep and slightly personal connections to, this one solely under the authorship of the man behind it all, Greg Mortenson. His story is so important, UB has invited him as part of their annual Distinguished Speakers Series- which has brought, or will bring, the likes of Arianna Huffington, Jon Stewart and the Dalai Lama to Amherst- and Greg's story will likely fill Alumni Arena on the night after my birthday in November. (Info about that here- let me know if you want to go with the book club, as we're going to get a set of tickets as a group.)
Having just finished my last August book-read, and our libraries being closed until Tuesday, I set out to Barnes & Noble for a copy of this worthwhile and important work. And,.... nothing. Not on the "new non-fiction" table, not next to the several copies of Three Cups they still carried.
Fortunately, I've always found their customer service desk to be helpful. These days, less so. Between their merciless pimping of their Nook readers and the dozens of copies you had to push past of the just-published memoir by Jill Kelly (wife of the Hall of Fame Bills quarterback and therefore in the local pantheon of sainthood), they didn't seem much interested in anything else. Finally, they found the one copy of Greg's Stones into Schools they had on premise, and placed it in my hands.
As I cashed out, I mentioned that it was the last copy, and that they probably should check their inventory; It's a popular book club selection, plus UB is bringing him to campus in November and there's going to be a demand for it. (Did I mention that this particular BN branch is within a walk of UB's campus- a difficult one perhaps, but certainly nothing for Greg, or even me back when I was a law student?)
I might as well have said to her that "the capital of South Dakota is Pierre." An interesting fact, perhaps, but one that meant nothing to her. Did I want my receipt in the bag, and did I want to see how to use a Nook reader? Have a nice day.
I'd have had a much nicer one, Jennifer S., if I had more of a sense that you cared about the words you sell as much as I care about them as a buyer.
Just as I'd had such an experience with an indy store recently, this one at the Big Book Box level left me cold. When Amazon's UK subsidiary can get a brand-new copy of an England-only DVD into my hands, by regular post/mail, four days after its release, I need a reason to shlep out in my car, to your bricks and your mortar, to make the time and effort worth my while, even just a little. This, I'm sad to say, was not that.