Vapid Vicki

I know, I know...customer service is dead. Or possibly on life support, but I really think it's dead. Still, once in a while can we get someone in the service industry who doesn't suck?

I went to The Fresh Market this evening to pick up a few things to make for dinner. If you haven't been to The Fresh Market, it's the place where they charge 3 times as much for groceries because they play Mozart and Handel while you shop, and all of the wheels on your shopping cart roll in the same drection. Since the A&P / Super Fresh / PathMark went out of business, it's the closest grocery store to my house by a wide margin. So once in a while I have to peddle myself out to The Prominade, take out a small bank loan, and pick up a few things.

I head back to the meat section, get two boneless chicken brests ($11.75...no I'm not exagerating, $11.75. You'd think the chicken would do my laundry for $11.75) some ground beef, and then pick up 3 other items and head to he checkout. Only 2 registers are open (no wonder, who can afford to shop there) and I get Vicki. Vicki is a blonde girl, about 17-18 with big brown eyes and that thousand yard stare. "How are you", I bellowed, because I do like to bellow when I shop. She just looks at me and started ringing up the groceries. I could immediately tell she was confused, one of my items did not have a bar code. Her head tilted a little to the side as she tried to recognize the product....after a minute or so, her brow furrowed and she asked, "Is this a sweet potato?" "Yup", I smiled, "looks like a good one." She went back to scanning my goods. By the way did I mention I was getting 5 things, right, not a whole lot of things to juggle. Anyway...she finishes and while I do the debit card dance paying for everything ($26.69 for 5 items.....and none of them contained gold leaf or white truffle oil). She hands me a bag....does something with her face that vaguely resembled a smile, and I head home to cook dinner.

So...I get home, warm up some pumpkin apple cider, and grate my sweet potato in hopes of making sweet potato pancakes (mildly successful, but nothing to write home about). I heat of the pans and go to break out my very, very expensive chicken, and...it's not there. In fact the groundbeef is MIA too. Shit! I grab my Galaxy Tab and get the phone number for The Fresh Market, and call.....ring.....ring.....ring. I let it ring for a whole 90 seconds, which is an eternity to let a phone ring, no answer. So...I get my shoes on, knowing full well I'm gonna have to go back there, and call again. This time somebody picked up on the 9th ring. It was Amy....no idea who Amy is or where she works in the store, but when I told he my plight. She said in a monotone voice, "I'll transfer you to the front of the store.". After 2 minutes, Mary picks up the phone. My luck changed a bit because I actually know Mary, so I don't have someone who could care less if my problem gets solved. Yes, they found my meat (watch it, this is a family blog), yes, they have it. And, yes, I have to get back in the car and get my stuff.

At this point I'd like to mention it was raining. Shocking to all of those people who live in the Lehigh Valley who have determined that we are now living in a Ray Bradbury story. It's not that the rain does anything in this story except make it a bit more miserable to go back to the store and get my gold bricks (I know...that would be silly, gold bricks aren't near that expensive.

I get to the store, and Vicki is there...vapid look and all, checking out another sucker paying $2.99 for honey crisp apples (once again, I'm not making that up....2 apples cost more than a gallon of milk and a new set of white walls for the Hyundai). She looks at me....cocks her head, furrows her brow again, and goes back to her bar codes. Mary sees me, says, hi, and goes back to the meat section to get my items. I purposely stand next to Vicki and smile....looking for her to say, "Hey, I'm sorry I screwed up by not handing you all of your bags, making you have to come back in the rain to the store, buring up 25 minutes and a $1 worth of gas". I would have settled for mumbled apology in my general direction. I mean look..I smiled. I'm not gonna take your face off. But an apology was not coming, just an occasion uncomfortable look, and the stare of a Stepford Wife. Mary asked about the family as she handed me my bag, I exchanged pleasantries, and headed into the rain and back to restart dinner.

A number of good questions come from this expereince. Why couldn't someone bring my groceries to me? Why couldn't I get a $5, I'm sorry coupon for having to peddle my ass back to the store? Why didn't someone answer the phone in a timely matter? But my favorite question....If you're charging 3 times as much for groceries, can you pay an extra buck an hour to cashiers so you can get someone with an IQ higher than my shoe size? That might not be fair, maybe Vicki is heading off to Princeton next year to study American Literature (and then would actually get my Ray Bradbury reference), but she has the personality of wall paper paste, and unless someone lines up electrshock therapy, I would guess she's not going to excel in the cutomer service industry. It's not that she made a mistake...everyone makes mistakes, I made at least a dozen of them before breakfast, but how 'bout an "I'm sorry. And The Fresh Market needs to come up with a better service recovery model than let's not answer the phone so we don't get an angry customer call.

Well....I won't be back to The Fresh Market anytime soon, mainly because I' d need to sell an awful lot of plasma to be able to afford their pumpkin salsa...but I do have higher expectations when I'm paying a premium for everyday products, maybe it's time to break out the elctros for Vapid Vicki and we can get them back on track.