Is this Any Way to Run A Business? Yeah, I Guess So......

'Is This the Way to Run A Business?'
The evolution of clerks in the mainstream American marketplace is a continuing mystery to me.
I used to feel at least a little bit important to the businesses I frequented. As if I mattered somehow to them.

That's still the case in a few places but more and more it's blatantly obvious that they don't care if I live or die just as long as they can collect my money and get me quickly out of their way. In fact, they often act as if taking my money was an unpleasant job and if I would just stay away altogether they could happily continue to stand around, smoke cigarettes, listen to loud music, laugh at strangers and then clock out after their shift.

I went to a business I regularly frequent the other day. This chain of businesses has taken the place in many communities of the old mom and pop neighborhood stores we had back in the old days when dinosaurs ruled the earth.

I told them I was looking for a box to use to ship a large package. I was informed that they 'don't sell boxes' and 'that they don't give them away'. I would have purchased a box if they sold them. I would happily have bought a used box- one of literally hundreds they throw away every week. But that's no longer an option. The clerk wasn't rude just enforcing company policy leaving me with the distinct impression I had just wasted many valuable hours of his and the company's time by making such a stupid request. This is only a tiny thing but my camel is getting perilously swaybacked from such small annoyances.

Many times in the check out line clerks will stare right through me (and every other customer) while having a wildly animated conversation with another clerk in the next line who is also busily ignoring their customers as well. No one hands you your purchases these days. They are placed in bags on a rotating carousel and it's your responsibility to rotate the thing sufficiently to make sure you get home with what you paid for. I'll eventually get used to this. But it was a nicer touch when the clerk would hand me my purchases and say 'thank you' as a finale to the transaction. This is a human touch we can do without. The corporate boardroom has spoken.

I used to work in our family mom and pop grocery store. We gave away boxes, helped people wrap packages, assisted with picking out just the right greeting card for the right occasion, stored stuff in our freezers for folks whose own freezers went on the blink, made deliveries, special orders, handed out credit to people we trusted, served as a community message center and helped find homes for stray animals among hundreds of other things.

The days of mom and pop stores are long passed. But I can say with pride that I was proud to have been a part of one of them. I learned from that experience how people are supposed to be treated.

Who in the marketplace is teaching those lessons today?