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Any stupid shop attendant stories?

#141
I bought a Squier Vintage Modified Jazz V at the local GC and when I took it home, I was tuning it up when one of the tuners broke off. I took the bass in the next day and the "guitar tech" there said I could buy a set and he could put the new ones on. I was like.."uh...I got this bass yesterday." and he said well, I can just clamp it down again with some pliers. lol WTH??? Anyway, I had to order a new one. Maybe he thought I wouldn't mind because I'm a woman? Whatever. haha I can go to the store across town and they know me by name and treat me with respect every time. I just wanted the VM right then and my store didn't have it.
 
#143
After I got out of grad school and got my first job I lived in a very cheap place and saved up a fair amount of money. Finally I decided I had enough and went to a large music store in Portland, OR. This was in the mid-80s. A sales guy came up and asked what I was looking for and I said a bass. He then asked how much I could spend and I said there was no limit and that was true. I could have bought nearly any bass made at that time and any in their store. He then walked over and said we have this fine instrument right here and pointed at a Korean copy that cost a hundred bucks. I turned around and walked out. Two weeks later I bought an Alembic from a different place. Ironically, the first place had them too.
 
#144
I have been a salesman and a store manager at both a music store and a Lowe's Home Improvement (assistant store manager at the latter). Let me correct you on one thing. It is NOT the job of a salesman to "know more than you do" about every topic covered in the store/department.

Obviously, if you are (for instance) a Fender fanatic, you will know more than any salesman about Fender products. However you may know nothing at all about the Alvarez acoustic hanging only 4 feet from your favorite Strat.

Some of my best salesmen at the music store were NOT EVEN MUSICIANS. And almost NO salesman at Lowe's was an electrician, plumber, painter, or flooring installer. However, many of them were amazing at customer service. And they were also HONEST if they didn't know the answer to a customer question (and promised to FIND OUT the answer).

The problem with many CUSTOMERS is that they EXPECT every single person who works at Lowe's to be an expert on the subject matter of whatever they are selling. It's impossible. Can you imagine how much a store would have to pay a bunch of professional musicians, sound techs, electricians, plumbers, etc. to work a sales floor???? And you guys already complain about prices. You haven't seen ANYTHING. Require every store to hire professionals for every department and see how much products cost.

I'm an electrician, and there's no way I would walk the floor of Lowe's for $8-10 an hour. Neither would any OTHER professional.

Are there some lazy dipsticks working sales floors these days? Absolutely. And that is something everyone has the right to complain about. But expecting the kid at GC to know everything a professional sound man would know or the kid at Lowe's to know everything a craftsman would know is ridiculous. Again, it is NOT their job to know more than you do about the product. They are supposed to help in any way they can and FIND OUT whatever they don't know.
 
#145
Some of these made me laugh out loud. Funny, I've never had a problem with either of the Long & McQuades (or any other music store really) I visit frequently. All the sales guys know me and my dad, and they generally know what they're talking about (and if they don't they're honest about it). The ones who are opinionated ("hey, I like that guitar") will tell you but not push you. It's good, and unusual.

OTOH, I had an interesting experience the third last time I was at my nearest location. I walk in, am idly browsing the bass section, find this sunburst MIM Jazz (ooh, exciting :rolleyes:) string with La Bella tapes. I thought huh, cool, and pick it up and go to the soundroom to test it. Next thing I know, random old African-American woman walks in and says "hey man, that's a cool bass, I play bass too! Lemme hear you play, man" and I was thinking :scowl: but I'm like uh..... (no but) okay, so I start playing an awful rendition of "Leave That Thing Alone" (unexpected pressure and an unfamiliar instrument screwed me over) and she's like "man, that bass really fits you blah blah blah I used to play them tapewound strings blah blah blah"...

I'm thinking oh god... so I give her the bass and go "do you want to try?" and she goes "well, aiight" and proceeds to bust out this crazy fluid slap lick... I was thoroughly surprised. She continued to ramble and eventually handed me the bass and goes "look at that only $400, you could take this sucker home right now" and leaves.

***. Didn't get to really examine the bass at all.

Other stores have had some interesting salespeople too. Princess Auto, for example. Dad and I walk in looking for a bullseye level. Sales guy, without looking up from his project (he's tightening the nut on something or other) goes nah, those got discontinued, we've only got those (points to opposite wall which contains unrelated product). Dad calls BS, goes looking and finds a rack FULL of the things. :hmm:

--Silvie
 
#146
One story that sticks out the most is when I went to try out my 70's Kustom 215B tolex cab. I ask the salesman what he knew about the cab expecting something along the lines of ohms wattage year etc... and the response I get is "uhhh its loud and heavy..."
 
#147
two fingers said:
I have been a salesman and a store manager at both a music store and a Lowe's Home Improvement (assistant store manager at the latter). Let me correct you on one thing. It is NOT the job of a salesman to "know more than you do" about every topic covered in the store/department.

Obviously, if you are (for instance) a Fender fanatic, you will know more than any salesman about Fender products. However you may know nothing at all about the Alvarez acoustic hanging only 4 feet from your favorite Strat.

Some of my best salesmen at the music store were NOT EVEN MUSICIANS. And almost NO salesman at Lowe's was an electrician, plumber, painter, or flooring installer. However, many of them were amazing at customer service. And they were also HONEST if they didn't know the answer to a customer question (and promised to FIND OUT the answer).

The problem with many CUSTOMERS is that they EXPECT every single person who works at Lowe's to be an expert on the subject matter of whatever they are selling. It's impossible. Can you imagine how much a store would have to pay a bunch of professional musicians, sound techs, electricians, plumbers, etc. to work a sales floor???? And you guys already complain about prices. You haven't seen ANYTHING. Require every store to hire professionals for every department and see how much products cost.

I'm an electrician, and there's no way I would walk the floor of Lowe's for $8-10 an hour. Neither would any OTHER professional.

Are there some lazy dipsticks working sales floors these days? Absolutely. And that is something everyone has the right to complain about. But expecting the kid at GC to know everything a professional sound man would know or the kid at Lowe's to know everything a craftsman would know is ridiculous. Again, it is NOT their job to know more than you do about the product. They are supposed to help in any way they can and FIND OUT whatever they don't know.
Click to expand...

I understand your point, and I do not expect sales people to know everything about everything, but I draw the line at those who obviously don´t know what they are talking about but make an issue about arguing with you and telling you that you are wrong!

For example...

I went into a music store in Genoa (Italy) and asked if they had any flatwound strings.

He tried to sell me some guitar strings, to which I pointed out (my fault) that I was looking for bass strings.

Are you sure you want flats? What bass are these for? and I answered that they were for a Fretless Jazz.

"Ah, fretless, in that case you need flats" was his answer.

Well, obviously I wanted flats, but by now (after about 10 mins of converation to get this far) I was intrigued as to why I needed flats.

"Well, it's a fretless, all fretless have to have flats!" :eyebrow:

"And why is that?" I asked, confused.

"Because it's a fretless, it has to have flats" he said in an irritated voice.

"But why??" I insisted.

"Because they are the only strings that work on a fretless!"

I assured him that my bass currently had rounds, and that it worked perfectly, to which he argued the point that I was obviously confused.

After another 5-10 minutes of discussion (geeting rather heated), he asked me if I played Jazz.

I said that I didn't, to which he suddenly brightened and said that he understood the problem, that my bass wasn't a jazz bass. :eek:



Unfortunately I have had lots of experiences similar to this!!
 
#151
I was in one of our local shops the other day talking with a friend that works there. Some guy walks in on a mission, asked for a one channel mixer board. So he pointed him to the section said the smallest one they had was a two channel. Starts getting into the details blah.. The guy asked if it had built in effects.. He said he needed delay and reverb. Told him that you have to get into the bigger boards for effects. Started bs'n with him asking if he needed it for a gig or whatever.. Turns out the guy wanted to hook it up to a CB radio? Didnt think much of it at the time but later got to thinking. Why would you need effects for a CB? Turns out hooking up to a mixer and a mic makes the cb much clearer. I still dont get the effects part.
 
#152
JACink said:
I understand your point, and I do not expect sales people to know everything about everything, but I draw the line at those who obviously don´t know what they are talking about but make an issue about arguing with you and telling you that you are wrong!

For example...

I went into a music store in Genoa (Italy) and asked if they had any flatwound strings.

He tried to sell me some guitar strings, to which I pointed out (my fault) that I was looking for bass strings.

Are you sure you want flats? What bass are these for? and I answered that they were for a Fretless Jazz.

"Ah, fretless, in that case you need flats" was his answer.

Well, obviously I wanted flats, but by now (after about 10 mins of converation to get this far) I was intrigued as to why I needed flats.

"Well, it's a fretless, all fretless have to have flats!" :eyebrow:

"And why is that?" I asked, confused.

"Because it's a fretless, it has to have flats" he said in an irritated voice.

"But why??" I insisted.

"Because they are the only strings that work on a fretless!"

I assured him that my bass currently had rounds, and that it worked perfectly, to which he argued the point that I was obviously confused.

After another 5-10 minutes of discussion (geeting rather heated), he asked me if I played Jazz.

I said that I didn't, to which he suddenly brightened and said that he understood the problem, that my bass wasn't a jazz bass. :eek:



Unfortunately I have had lots of experiences similar to this!!
Click to expand...

I went into a local music shop and asked for guitar flats which they didn't have and I was questioned why I wanted them and what style of music I was playing. I said mainly indie rock and I wanted to try them. I got the similar response of "your not playing jazz you don't need them." Didn't feel like arguing so I walked out.
 
#153
Well, stores in my country usually dont fancy selling Flatwound bass strings, especially cheap ones like D'Addario, so when my mother was flying to america i took the chance and told her to order me a set of D'Addario Chromes 50-105 Long Scale.
She apparently went to about 2 GCs and both of them told her "We only have regular strings"... :rollno:
 
#154
DudeLeap said:
One story that sticks out the most is when I went to try out my 70's Kustom 215B tolex cab. I ask the salesman what he knew about the cab expecting something along the lines of ohms wattage year etc... and the response I get is "uhhh its loud and heavy..."
Click to expand...

At least he didn't try to b.s. you.
 
#156
"I don't care what you think I need, now are you going to sell me what I want, or do I really have to go online and buy there?"

Or

"And this kind of clueless service is what makes online shopping such an attractive proposition"

Only two of a bunch of similar responses those guys deserved...
 
#157
I went to my local GC last year to buy an Electrosocket for my Telecaster so I could use a right angle jack with the guitar...they don't work well with the vintage cup socket on Teles. Anyway the kid in the accessories dept not only hadn't ever heard of the Electrosocket but asked me how it worked and if you needed a power adapter for it.
 

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