Hed: Retail as metaphor for life

Sub: It’s like watching a terrible train wreck

Working in retail, I experience a wide array of human perspectives and am confronted with the challenge of engaging in society. Part of this means being confronted with ideas and beliefs vastly different from my own, and acknowledging this is part of inhabiting a planet with 6 billion people. Respecting the diversity of ideas can be a justification for the steadfastness of one’s own beliefs.

A coworker once commented that the oddities of customers are like train wrecks — you know you should try to help, but just end up watching as things get worse and worse. As his manager, I informed him that he should try focusing on customer service, but he has a point — often, the expectations, attitudes and even wardrobes of customers sometimes need to be figuratively crashed.

Retailers offer suggestions, ideas and fashion inspiration while running around fetching for customers and embodying “chipper-ness.” This is a rewarding job if you believe in fashion as a means of communication. The retail worker provides customers with important tools to craft and develop an iconic image while defining or interpreting their personality as they see fit.

Why must select customers be challenging — living by ideas and concepts so alien and inexcusably bizarre that nobody can comprehend their logic?

Last week, I had a customer pitch a fit over a coupon.

I was hanging baby Easter dresses and asked a lady swarming with toddlers how her day was and whether or not she was finding everything all right.

She immediately demanded if I would honor a coupon she received in the mail. Knowing the demented thought process typical to brash demands, I carefully replied that if the coupon was for our store, used for applicable merchandise and within its viable dates, we would be thrilled to accept it.

With an eye roll and snort of exasperation, she began to describe the coupon to me in terms of its material properties and colors. I asked if she would let me see it in order for me to better help her. She didn’t have it.

I let her know that when she did have it with her, given that it followed the same conditions I originally outlined for its viability, we would gladly honor it.

She sarcastically snapped that she had children and nothing better to do than go home to get coupons. As she stalked away, I used our nifty headset walkie-talkies to tell the entire staff not to honor any coupon if the coupon was not actually present. Failure to do this is giving customers questionable, random discounts.

As I, too, am human, I understand the stress of leaving things at home. But this woman asked no less than four other employees if they’d give her the 30 percent off without a coupon. Following my instructions, they upheld policy.

Eventually, the woman produced the coupon supposedly from her house. It was for a sale last month at one of our parent company’s other retail stores, and thus only slightly less random than expecting a QFC coupon for steak to apply to CDs at Barnes & Noble.

She complained that after all her trouble, we weren’t being cooperative and wasted her time.

Instead of calling her names and coloring my retellings of this story with nasty asides of her physical appearance, I breathe and laugh. To me, it’s obvious that coupons should be brought on shopping trips. I’d never expect an employee to give me whatever discounts I told them to. I accept the responsibility of my occasional lack of responsibility. I understand expiration dates and that one store is not required to accept coupons for other stores. But that’s just me, and I’m neither perfect nor the model of reasonable expectations.

We’re all on this planet together, so it makes sense to just roll with the challenges as misunderstandings present themselves. As unreasonable and stupid as we may find others, know that they’re thinking the same about us.

Reach columnist Matt Jackson at opinion@dailyuw.com.