I am regularly unimpressed by service in various shops, particularly the larger branches, however today’s display in WHSmith was stunningly bad but they did rectify it fairly sharpish when I complained.
I went down for WHSmith opening to get a card and magazine, got there 15 minutes early so sat reading on my Kindle Reader (Treasure Island… arrrrr)… only to watch a massive queue materialise on the other side of the doors.
When the doors opened I walked in, ignoring the massive queue (and dirty looks by said massive queuers who obviously hadn’t noticed I’d been sat there for the best part of 15 minutes – long before any of them appeared) and went to the cards. The queue filed in, went straight to the checkout, and proceeded to collect Lego items. I’m not sure which paper is giving them away free, but they were Lego Buzz Lightyear figures.
“I’m not queueing with them bloody freeloaders” I thought – spending 40p on a paper they don’t really want to get a lego figurine. Especially since I wasn’t the only one showing despair at the fact that our normally quiet Sunday Morning saunter to WHSmith had turned into a badly planned farce.
What was worse – the back checkouts were closed, and a sign on them said “book orders only”… I had a plan!
I went to the book orders checkout, pressed the button, and out came the shift manager.
I said “I’d like to order a book please”.
She said “what book is that then?”
Me “How to manage newspaper promotions correctly”
She said “whose it by?”
I said “well obviously not the person who thought closing this counter was a good idea when 200+ people wanted a Lego figurine yet regular customers were going to Morrisons for their papers and magazines rather than face a 25 minute queue”
… she opened the counter to other sales only… and the titters of the people who also bought their non-lego purchases there was rather amusing.
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