Rizik's Bridal Shmidal Store

One of best friend's calls me this am about her uncomfortable & disappointing experience at this upscale bridal store (www.riziks.com) on Connecticut Ave this weekend. In search of the bridal gowns for the bridal party she made an appt. She arrived at the shop with her Matron of Honor and guess what? they were greeted properly and offered assistance promptly! yeah right Of Course NOT!!

Noone even attempted to acknowledge their presence but all the while continued to dote all over the 1 other bride-to-be that was there, lets call her Susie. After about 10mins of waiting she inquired with a sales assoc about 1 of the dresses that they had to find themselves. The sooooo busy associate (lets call her Rudey) cause thats just was she was; pointed them in a direction of more dresses and trotted off. Uuuuhhh clearly there's no need to offer any assistance or even inquire as to what they were looking for in the store. That would be just too much like right.

After being sloshed into a dressing area where they tried dresses, my friend asks for the color swatches. So Rudey says, 'I need to know the material!' Im no expert, but what does the material have to do with a color & if you're the one who works there handling dresses all day, wouldnt you know the material? Anywho, she basically drops the color samples off and again leaves to finish her inventory or whatever. All the while she and um 'Becky'(Assoc #2) are all too happy to offer options, alteration info, compliments and any other normal service that a bridal shop usually gives; to Susie.

What... everyone doesn't deserve the same type of service??
No but it gets better, she doesn't want to provide the costs of any of the dresses (she says its listed on the tags, find them & look) no info on ordering the other gowns that werent available in the store and then states, that for any purchases 'payment is required in full at the time of order.' Did she tell the other girl that; prob not.

They both realized that these folks were not interested in providing them any type of real service and decided to leave but not BEFORE the ignorant insinuation of >Becky, are those earrings we had out, still there?< umm what u tryin to say?? Hmmm. U be the judge?

Stellar Cust Service this is not? Did the Conn. Ave persona have anything to do with this service? Better be glad I wasn't there.. :0( Aww friend. Sorry u had to go thru that NONSENSE!! They just lost A BIG SALE - Im sure the owners would luv to hear about it and trust ... they will! ;)

Home Depot (Oxon Hill) Paint Dept

U all are aware of the 'we match anything' slogan right? Well I took a color I found in Lowe's to see if Home Depot could match it and offer a better price...

Okay so I go to the paint counter wait for 6-7 minutes before the guy working their says 'U need some help wit paint?' Umm why would I be at the PAINT counter if I didn't need help with PAINT! Anywho, I say yes and then give him the swatch. He says this is from Lowes. umm yeah I guess I didn't already know that. So I just look at him like Duhhhh and ask again 'Are you able to match or make this color?' He says again 'this is from Lowes' so I guess me ignoring that comment earlier prompted him to say it again. So now other customers are looking and by the way waiting to be helped. I say again, lets try sumthing different. Are Yooouu A-Ble to MAATCH or MAKE this Color? (I say slowly) This clearly upset him and says well I'll try and walks away. He walks around in a circle then comes right back and says again it might be easier to just get it from Lowes.

Now where in the Employee Manual does it say 'Please refer customer to another competing store at all times!?' That's productive and lucrative.

I then huff & say, your commercial says that you can match anything. You just helped a lady who had a piece of a piece of tile that she found on the floor. You matched it with no questions! So are you able to do it or not! He's gets all idignant and says if you want me to help you just have to ask in a certain way. WTH is that? I hurt his feelings? Im thinking, How else am I to ask you to do your job. I've only tried twice. I walked over to another customer and said can you ask him to make this (giving her the swatch) sample please? She laughed. I walk back to him and say very nicely. I've come into Home Depot's paint section with THIS color swatch, I would like to know if YOU can make me a sample in this color. If you are not able to do so please let me know of whom I can talk to in order to get it...

After about 45mins I FINALLY walked out with my paint sample. Why was this sooooooooooooo hard?? He should've just took the color, put it in the machine and let it attempt to match the color. If it didn't work, oh well, he tried right? that would have been good customer service.

Who argues with a customer?

Sooo why this blog?? Im so tired...

I feel like I'm always in situations where the Art of Customer Service is challenged. Is there a such thing as good customer service anymore? So I decided to share my displeasure with some stores I've visited and their lack of quality customer service. Clearly I shop enough to have story-a-plenty. Feel free to share your own experiences. Please do, I can't be the only one going thru these shanannagans(sp?).

Now I will say that I've had a few instances where I've been pleasantly surprised with good cust service but trust that they're far & few between. Instead I've been shocked & sometimes appalled at the lack of customer service. Why do people take jobs in these fields if they're not interested in doing their jobs??

With that being said; I welcome you to my world... as weird and interesting as it can be.