Saturday 31st January - Tired, Cranky and Whinging

Things that are annoying me today...

1. Football Hooligans - Idiots. You'd think that they would consider a wardrobe change to make it difficult to spot them but no. I think they like people to know what cretins they are. I Saw some at the station this morning and their Burberry hats and Stone Island jackets just scream out 'I am a twat who knows nothing about the actual game of football but likes to fight'. Football has enough problems as it is without the word itself preceding hooligan to create such a vile subculture. Why do you never get Rugby hooligans? Or Tennis hooligans? Why aren't Andy Murray 'fans' calling up Roger Federers 'followers' to rendezvous just outside Melbourne Park to engage in fisticuffs?

2. Teenagers - They can't talk quietly, they shuffle around in packs and I hate them. One particular low jeans wearing lothario was swanning around the shop chomping on a pastry from Greggs, spilling most of it on my hallowed shop floor. I looked at him and said in my most authoritarian voice: " Do you mind not spilling your pastry all over the floor mate".
It may not sound like much but his chums spent the next 5 minutes ripping it out of him and I basked in their collective laughter.

Nico 1-0 Teenagers

3. Someone left an empty Starbucks cup in the shop. This is a great excuse to rant about the soul stealing brand from across the pond. There are four in the town centre, FOUR!! Reading isn't that big, we're not even a bloody city. Firstly, it's far too expensive. Secondly, it'll make you fat. A vanilla bullshit cappulatte grande milkacino has nearly as many calories as a big mac. If they keep saturating the market then independent traders aren't going to be able to compete. If I had a surefire way of not getting apprehended I would orchestrate a synchronised window smashing of all the Reading locations (After closing of course. I'd like to avoid any bystander injuries). I just want to stick it to 'The Man'.

4. It's seriously cold.

5. I have football tomorrow but my legs feel heavier than an American at an all you can eat buffet. If my muscles don't loosen up soon people will start calling me the Tin Man.

6. Thinking back to last nights poker game and how irritating my brother is when intoxicated, and winning. It's a truly horrific combination.

7. The Guardian magazine printed the answer to the Scrabble puzzle halfway through so I accidentally saw the solution before seeing the conundrum thus ruining it for me.

Luckily, this photo cheered me up.

GOOD LORD! Known simply as... Man who looks like thumb.


On a more serious note, whilst meandering through the Oracle with a friend, we both remarked how frustrating it was when the people strolling in front of you stop all of a sudden. The third occasion this happened was at an escalator. A most inconvenient time for such deceleration I thought, so mumbled something loudly enough so the group in front could hear. As it turned out one of the people ahead of us had a learning disability. The dad of the group gave me a look that made me feel smaller than an ants suitcase. I felt awful. I'm very sorry, it was an honest mistake.


Retail Lesson #3

Only try and humiliate customers who are younger, smaller and geekier than yourself.

Customer quote of the day


Me: "are you OK?"

Teenage Girl: (softly spoken and shivering) "I can't open my purse. My hands are fucking cold"

You had to be there!





Nico

Thursday 29th January - Common Sense

Common sense is a wonderful thing. Simply, some possess it and some do not. During my years at But is it Art? I have seen thousands of punters come and go, each with an original take on the concept of common sense (I don't want to keep it writing to so lets go acronym crazy and call it CS). This has encouraged me to formulate a graph, which demonstrates the CS of shop dwellers in direct proportion to my assumed intelligence of them, and as a result, how much it will cause me to dislike them.

Here are my results:

CUSTOMER COMMON SENSE GRAPH (CCSG)

Disclaimer: The results on this graph are entirely based upon my thoughts and do not represent the philosophy of But is it Art?, its staff, its shoppers, or any company that deals with, or affiliates itself with But is it Art?

Based on the results of the Customer Common Sense Graph (CCSG) one can immediately see that thick individuals (or groups, I don't like to discriminate) are a lost cause. These are the people who ask vague questions such as, "Where do you get your cards from?" and "Do you sell picture frames?"

However, the most annoying, excruciating thing that a customer with no CS does is to remove their credit card from the pin machine before he or she is meant to. A regular excuse is because they saw the words 'remove card'. What they fail to include is the fact that adjacent to these is the phrase 'DO NOT'. Why are you looking at the right hand side of the screen? How do you read a bloody book? Left to right, that's how. The pin machine is not Jewish and is not written in Hebrew so why start reading from that side? You imbecile.

If everyone began to ignore these important words in other everyday situations anarchy would ensue. Young wrestling enthusiasts would be trying things at home, destroying tables, ladders and chairs. Zookeepers would spend half the day mopping up the blood of foolish humans who had decided that feeding the lions was a good idea, and swimming pools would be awash with illegal activities such as running, bombing, shouting, pushing and the old favourite, heavy petting.

Referring back to the CCSG, the bearable customers make CS mistakes that are of a mild annoyance and only result in a small and disposable anger on my part. An example happened this very morn when a lady bought two items that came to £6.50. She left the shop but returned 5 minutes later wondering why she had been charged this amount for these two purchases. I told her the individual prices and she thought the calendar was supposed to be half price. I explained it already was and blah blah fucking blah. She changed her mind and I refunded it without fuss. Then I thought to myself why did she knowingly pay £6.50, when to her the transaction should have been £4? Why don't you look at the amount on the receipt or the till before you pay you berk? You could've saved both of us the hassle couldn't you love?

Moving on.

Like a solitary rose in a garden full of weeds, a realistic Newcastle United fan or an honest politician good customers with exceptional CS are hard to find. When you do get one it's like being on crack (Just to clarify I don't actually know what this feels like, I just mean it's very moreish). The transaction flows effervescently on a creamy cloud of wavy wonderment where unicorns dance and I am the King of the party. The chat is polite, brief and informative, the purchase paid for in cash. The customer acknowledges my presence but doesn't pretend to be my friend and we both respect the boundaries that the sacred shop counter represents. It's beautiful.

The worst culprits highlighted on the CCSG are the brain elite. Like Spidermans Uncle says, "With great intelligence, comes great stupidity". I might have changed most of the words to that line but you get the point. Why is it that those with superior intellectual capacity also have the ability to fall between staircases, pull out a woman's hair on a bus or have absolutely no social awareness whatsoever? I'm stumped.

Maybe, just maybe, they have too much information stored inside their Mensa minds. The simple act of purchasing a birthday card is too difficult because they are overflowing with considerations about how tough it must be for a lone, independent shop to survive in the cuthroat, capitalist, Starbucks loving society in which we live where the challenging economic climate and the constant homogenising of products and corporate takeovers makes it a constantly demanding task to run a successful business. aaaaaand breathe....
Or! They are just dumb too and I'm giving them undeserved credit. That's probably it.

I conclude that the CCSG is 99% accurate and you should disagree at your peril.

On a lighter note...


Comedy customer quote of the day

"This is a postmodern gift shop, FUCKING HELL! I'm surprised you don't get raided by the police"

(An incredibly charismatic, middle aged West Indian man with a beaming smile who reminded me of a thin version of my favourite secondary school geography teacher, what a legend).

Retail lesson #2

If you expect the worst of a customer, you can never be disappointed.

Homework

Relax, you've had a hard day.




Nico

Tuesday 27th January - Daydreaming

I knew this would happen. It's poetic justice, or cruel irony, or something like that. I start a blog to regale stories of amusement and disbelief in my place of work and on only the second day I have absolutely nothing to talk about. The minions actually behaved themselves today. One lady did inadvertently insult my colleague Steve but he made her feel uncomfortable so justice was served almost instantly. The whole episode screamed of a cringeworthy scene from The Office. She may not return for a while.

I did have quite an odd dream on Saturday night. I was at a friends party (a fantastic party too I might add) and several things that had featured throughout the evening created the ingredients for what was a particularly random sleeping hallucination. I was discussing with someone how I preferred it when a girl made you work for her affection, having it given to you on a plate we deliberated, was not a hugely attractive quality. I guess it depends on a multitude of factors but based on the situation I felt I was in my thought processes led me to believe that this was the correct course of action. Maybe this is why i am single.

Anyway, my night time coma experience began with me chasing a girl around various different places, a green area with statues and a water park spring to mind. Coincidentally, it was a girl I had met at the party who I was chasing, and as dreams go, it was panning out splendidly. Running around, flirting and with a knowingness that something good was likely to occur. When I located her at the end of a flume in my fantasy water world I excitedly moved in for a kiss, only to be knocked back almost immediately. She then smiled quite demonically and suddenly disappeared. BITCH (may I point out that the human version of this person is anything but).

Confused was not the word, I had no idea what had just taken place. Luckily for me another friend appeared, also a party guest that night and also the friend that had introduced me to the girl who was now rejecting me in my sleep. I remember this much of the conversation...

Me: "What just happened, why didn't she kiss me?"

Elin: "Because she's a Jehovah's Witness!"

RIDICULOUS. Though at the time I accepted this as a perfectly reasonable excuse! After reading up on the aforementioned religious movement tonight I still have no clue as to its significance. Maybe it was an elaborate Monty Python gag that went straight over my head, or perhaps I should just stop writing this very second.

I pray something happens at work tomorrow. If I have to keep describing my dreams I'm likely to be committed.

Shit, I've got a day off.




Nico

The beginning of something mediocre - Monday 26th January

So...

I work in But is it Art? (As featured in The Guardian independent shopping guide 2007)
The shop has been in Reading for over 30 years and sells all manner of weird and wonderful cards, gifts, t-shirts and pictures.

Enough of the shameless plugging.

After being inspired by a French checkout girl (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/france/4029292/French-check-out-girl-becomes-best-selling-author.html) i decided to document the goings on of my day to day encounters with the shoppers of my precious town.

Something i have noticed when it comes to retail is that the words used to describe the place you work often has a direct correlation with the personality of its customers. I often hear the adjectives 'funky', 'different' and 'cool' bounce off the shop walls and these words exemplify the kind of buffoons who set foot into the beloved place i call work. Throw in the odd Daily Mail reader, packs of ironically cheery emo kids and a man who thinks i'm called Charlie and we're just touching the surface of something quite magical. Nothing would give me more pleasure than seeing 'But is it Art?' the sitcom air on BBC3 at 1.30 in the morning sometime in the future. Anyway, enough rambling of dempgraphics and television aspirations...

In my opinion, there is no doubt that the customer is the most intriguing aspect of any retail environment. The individuals i encounter on a daily basis are all beautifully unique yet contradict themselves with an aura of overwhelming stupidity. Like a plague of paradoxical zombies they meander around the shop, confused looks on their faces, relying on you to save them from any problem they may encounter because, as i have learned, a customer not only expects you to know everything about the place in which you work, they expect you to know everything about EVERYTHING.

Today, a man brought up a fire bucket ashtray (£7.50, an excellent gift for any smoker) to the counter and enquired how much it would cost to send said item by post to Japan. How the fuck should i know!?
What a preposterous question, maybe i had the look of a Japanese postman?
I explained politely i had no idea how much it would cost to send and he trotted off to return it from whence it came. This got me thinking, If i had instantly given him an approximate figure would he have followed through with the purchase or was this whole interaction destined to be a waste of his and my time?
I'm fairly confident it's the latter, which again got me thinking...
Why did he even bother in the first place?
To be honest, i don't think he knew. I do have sympathy for these people, put me in an office anywhere and i become a giant baby, incapable of completing the most basic of tasks. Certain habitats just don't suit certain people and this inevitably leads to foolish behaviour.

Despite my mild annoyance at this micro experience i am still absolutely fascinated by what the clientele of tomorrow will bring to the table. These little nuggets of patron idiocy are so essential to my daily grind that i should probably welcome them rather than rant about them. Ranting is a lot of fun though. I would like to point out that i had nothing against the customer who annoyed me today, he's probably a jolly nice chap when he's not buying ashtrays. And this was the most interesting transaction i had, twas a boring monday. I couldn't have written nearly as much about the lady who dropped her change on the floor.

Stereotype of the day

Australian man buys lighter wearing a straw hat with Fosters logo emblazoned around the edge.

Retail Lesson #1

The customer expects you to know everything about EVERYTHING.

Homework

Brush up on Royal Mail international parcel prices



Nico