yet another, SAVED!....AS!.....DRAFT!

*note: i broke those sunglasses over there in my profile...shit!...but never fear, i got a three dollar pair of women's frames that look almost identical...eh

a lady was in the store yesterday and wanted to know how much an item, that was not yet tagged, cost. lisa, the owner here, had not yet seen the item, so i had no help there. but i felt obliged to get a price for the lady, if possible, because a frequent customer had called the lady from the store phone telling her to come see it. it was in my mind to tell the customer to tell the lady that we didn't have a price yet, but since i heard that she was just leaving a message, i figured we might have it priced by then. this frequent customer fashions custom blinds and such at a very high cost and usually only works for those that have a lot of money, so, when the lady did make it in, i, then, felt like i should do what i could to give her a price. it's especially good to get those with a lot of spending money on your good side. and, generally, at least around here, the richer the person, the more valuable they think their time is, and the more priveledged they want to be treated. i'm good at this. but don't get the wrong idea about this lady. she's quite nice and understanding as i found out when we hit some hard times (or maybe it's just because i'm that good =P. for real, i just spent 20 minutes pointing out how she's right, but also once i'd back her off with that tactic, i'd get her verbal approval of my points against her.)

so, to make this short story longer, i decided to call the consignor of the night stand in question. a frequent consignor, this lady usually balks at pricing her own items. she buys things at auctions and so cares more than the casual consignor about the profit she makes. some feel otherwise, but this lady has found that lisa, the owner, prices items higher than she, the consignor, would. i remembered this too late however. and when i called to see if she wanted to price the night stand that the lady was interested in, she did so with some, but not much, reluctance.

she asked me if i thought $65 was good and i said it sounded fine. i told her that we'd go ahead and sell it to this lady at $65 if she wanted it, and if not, we'd let lisa agree or adjust that price when she got back.

i've done this many times. it usually works out fine. but i made a big mistake this time. i told the lady $65, and i could tell she was interested in the night stand at that price. but i neglected to mention the very very important things like, 'we'll sell it at $65 right now, but when the owner (lisa) gets back, if she wants to change the price, she can.' i make sure to say those kinds of things generally. i make it a point to let people understand that almost everything is not definite. i say 'the movers generally charge $40 for the first item and $5 for each additional (even though they do 99.9% of the time in a ten mile radius of altoona), but it's their business and so i can't guaruntee it.' other workers here bother me with their constant assurances to customers. the one lady in particular, all day, can be overheard saying rediculous things are definite, in a hugely loud and overly appeasing voice, with crazy random inflections like, 'oh lisa would take that. oh yes. yes (nodding her head vehemously). yes. oh yeees. she takes those. yes.' when i've learned years ago, you never talk in definites, especially about lisa.

digressing being the main point of this article, i'll get back to the story. we left off with me failing to tell the lady that there were questions in the air about the price of the item if she didn't buy it now. i was sidetracked though. we discovered that the night stand had the wrong handle on it. i tried to do something about this via screws and things, but eventually we realized that it couldn't be helped. well, this was why the lady probably didn't get the night stand then and there.

ok. no problem. she leaves.

later in the day, the frequent customer that does blinds and had called the customer, came back in. i told her what we eventually priced the item at and she was amazed to find that the lady didn't buy it at $65 even with the handle problem. she eventually left. and called the lady and told her something like that most likely.

then, later, as i was coming back from lunch, the consignor of the item and lisa were bothin the store, hunched in thought above the stand. lisa felt that $65 was not expensive enough and told the consignor so, and the price became, officially, $85.

that's right.

here then, is the surprise climax of the story. this morning, one day later, that very same lady came back into the store! my first thought was of the thought i had yesterday once lisa put $85 on the item. the thought was, 'hmm, i wonder what should be done if that lady that was told $65 comes back in tomorrow?'

so i broke the bad news to the lady, and i really could have just left it there. but i felt guilty, and plus, there's little else to do at work than talk to people. so i dove in. i decided to call lisa to see what she'd say. predictably (if i call her on the phone about things, she demands that i do what she wishes she would do if she was dealing with a problem like this in person. but often, she generally gives in to appease a customer when she's face to face with them) i'm told to stay firm on the price. if she wanted to buy it at $65 she should have bought it yesterday.

the lady voiced appreciation that i called, but i wasn't done yet. i went into her points and how she felt and even pointed out things that supported her case that she may not have thought of, and sometimes, though, i'd switch it back around on her. i said things like, 'it's a common feeling, i'd think, now, with chain stores and places like mcdonald's that if they make a mistake, they'll generally just give you the item at the price. and so you expect a store to be like that. but when you deal with stores with a private owner and how we're selling items that aren't even owned by us, if we make a mistake by mislabling an item on the internet or in the store, we're personally affected and don't have the ability to just take the loss.' and i told her that i realized it was unfair to her to make a trip out here and have the price changed. but i explained to her what happened.

edit: how did this story end? as i recall, pretty badly, actually. but anyway, it's been saved as draft for, wellhellhell, quite some time. so here it is in all its unfinished glory.