Why Do They Even Ask?
One gripe I have that seems to repeat itself nearly every time I go grocery shopping; at checkout the clerk will often ask, “Did you find everything you needed?”, to which I usually reply “Almost everything.” I do this on purpose and only once has someone stopped and said “Oh, what didn’t you find?” On this particular day, I scoured the store for an item I know the competitor store carries, but they’re a couple miles further drive. My fault. Any way, I mentioned at the checkout that this item was nowhere to be found, yet “So and so carries it, why don’t you?” “I dunno.” Great, what an utterly unhelpful exchange. Right here, I have given this business an opportunity to earn me as a repeat, loyal customer, but they’re too lazy or disinterested to care. Don’t they have a mechanism in place to see if they can get what I want? The item is no big deal for them, they carry the brand, but just not this particular product.
Lesson: if the customer says what they want and you have the ability to give it to them, why don’t you just do it? Why risk losing your customer for no reason at all?
I will be shopping at the competitor from now on for the majority of my items, using these guys only for a back up for my quickie purchases. Bank on it.
