Ch-Ching!
So, it's Saturday morning and you're out and about early running errands. The last item on your list is to return the moss-covered, three-handled family gredunza you picked up last week - it's too moss-covered and the wrong size to boot.
You locate the customer service desk - and your heart just sinks. The line-up is long, yes, but currently standing at the service desk is some old-fogey senior monopolizing all the clerk's time and attention.
And you just know that that old-fogey senior has already been monopolizing the clerk's time and attention for absolutely hours and will continue to do so for hours more.
The only thing you can do is mutter R-rated things under your breathe and wonder why this old-fogey senior can't do whatever it is they're doing during the week.
Since they're an old-fogey senior, they're probably retired and therefore have all the time in the world during the week to take care of their customer service needs.
I feel your pain, 'cause I was once one of those harried, hurried shoppers standing in the customer service line on Saturday morning wondering the same thing.
But now that I've joined the ranks of the gainfully unemployed, I totally get it!
I totally get why all old-fogey seniors terrorize customer service clerks on a Saturday morning in particular, or on any other day of the week in general.
Because we can!
And I admit it - I am now one of those old-fogey seniors standing at a customer service desk right now, monopolizing all of the clerk's time and attention!
And I find myself standing at customer service desks with alarming frequency now!
But in my defense, I'm not complaining that the fluorescent lights in the food court are too bright, or that I tripped in parking lot because the white lines are too high, or that by the time that I got home, the ginger ale in the bottle was flat.
I often find myself at customer service desks complaining about the lack of customer service on the sales floor, lack of product on shelves (has anyone else noticed, for instance, that WalMart's shelves are as lacking in product as Target's shelves were?).
And when I am standing at various customer services desks monopolizing all of the clerks time and attention I try to make a point of mentioning the lack of services and products available for my/our demographic group (for me, that demographic used to be 55+, now it's 60+.)
If we are to believe Forbes magazine, BNN, TDFinancial and all of the other financial gurus and prognosticators out there, the baby boomer retirees are most financially well-heeled group of seniors to ever hit the retail landscape.
So if figure I'm just doing businesses a favour by pointing out the lack of products, services and infrastructure available to the more "mature" shopper and more importantly, the retailers lack of interest in providing those products, services and infrastructure.
Since we have the time and more importantly, the money, we gainfully unemployed baby boomers are entitled to have the appropriate level of comfort, pampering, and attention lavished on us while those self-same retailers fleece of us of our hard-earned pension cheques!
After all, it's the principle of the thing!
Hey, if we play our cards right, we old fogey seniors could be the ones who save brick and mortar establishments! (Have you ever tried to push a walker around a WayFair or Amazon web site!)
So the next time you feel that your favourite retailer isn't properly courting your money or your newly-exalted lifestyle, find the customer service desk, e-mail the address on the back of the sales receipt, track down the manager, call head office.
Handicapped parking spaces for everyone!!!!
(can you tell I just had a run-in with a smarmy, young un floor manager?)
(moss-covered, three-handled family gredunza - Cat in Hat, Dr. Seuss)
