Salesmen – Page 8 – My Thought Spot

A whole lot of nothin’ going on

Quick run down of the day.

I went over to a friend’s house to help with a computer problem he was having. Ended up being that his DSL modem was fried by lightening. While there, I stopped at the transmission shop next door to have them top of my tranny fluid and tell me I really need to get the fluid changed before I go on my trip. I decided against it. I hope that does not come back to bite me.

I then came home and picked up the wife so that we could do some quick running around. I needed one part for the truck. We swung into a parts store that has always been pretty good about having needed parts for my Chevrolet. They did not have it, but they recommended another store. Even told me which part number I needed. I decided to pick up a fuel filter. I have replaced those way too frequently since being here.

We did more running around and then came home for lunch. I also changed the fuel filter.

I headed downtown to the parts store that should have the sensor I needed. Grabbed the part and looked under the hood to see if I could match it up and change it myself. My mechanic is the one who told me what I needed, therefore I was clueless as to what it did or where it was. Unable to find the part on the truck, I buzzed out to the mechanics house. TPS for 1990 Suburban

The mechanic was home, thankfully. Wrong part. I even looked in the book at the parts store and verified that it was the right part number for my truck. But, that was not it. So with the truck running horribly, I had to go back down town. I got most of the way there and decided to go home and pull the part off the truck since I then knew which part it was.

After stopping at the house and getting the car I then went down town again, but this time with part in hand. They did not have the part. Better yet, they don’t give you your money back either. You only get store credit. That’s not a huge deal since I get stuff from them somewhat regularly, but I was counting on that cash to be able to buy the new part. They had no recommendations for who might have the part, but my mechanic had suggested a place (almost an hour away).

On my way to my mechanic’s suggestion, I decided to try a place where I had scored pretty well before. They did not have it, but recommended two other stores. I hit one and the other was closed. Off to find the store the mechanic suggested. Long story short, after an hour of driving around in the approximate area, I never found it. Really it did not matter. Most parts stores close at 5:00 and it was well after 5:00 by this time. I was just hoping to locate it so that I could make it there tomorrow morning.

Since lunch it has been a 5 hour quest to find this part. Nothing.

Why not call? Well, every parts store I went to shows in their books that my truck needs the exact same part as what I originally bought. If I don’t take in the physical sensor to do a part comparison with, then I won’t get the right part. They can say they have it, but no one really knows until I go in with what I have.

That’s just the way it is. My “to-do” list for today included about a half a dozen things. I accomplished three. 1). Telling my friend that I could not help him fix his Internet connection. 2). Changing the fuel filter. 3). Complaining to you as to how hard it is to get anything accomplished around here.

The curse reveals itself

After my wonderful trip to Road Runner Sports yesterday afternoon, I went to Fry’s Electronics. I guess as a proof that the curse was still with me, I had an equally disappointing time at Fry’s.

I have been in several Fry’s stores through the southwestern US. I have learned not to expect the world from the sales staff. I was looking for a new mouse for my wife. She has a particular affinity for a certain style scroll wheel. I wanted to see if I could find one.

Though there were several mouses on display as part of a mouse/keyboard combo, they did not have any of the standalone mouses on a display rack. I found one that I wanted to touch and feel and asked the salesman if I could see a display model of that mouse. He promptly told me “No, we don’t have any displays of any of our mouses.” I said that I needed to touch it before I would buy it. To which he said that the package was form fitting enough to get a feel for the mouse. Well, of course, you can’t feel the scroll wheel through the plastic. I asked if we could open it, to which he said no. So, I told him I would not be making a mouse purchase that day. It was fine with him.

Then I took a stroll through the rest of that department. I saw 22 different mouses on display attached to computer display models. I would have laughed if I was not so angry.

I then wandered through the rest of the store not interested in purchasing anything after that.

My trip to Road Runner Sports

Today I had one of the most wonderful experiences of my life. If you hang around me long enough you will see that I am cursed. Actually, I have turned my curse into a never ceasing source of entertainment. The curse is that I am constantly plagued by idiotic (I will try to avoid the word “stupid”) salesmen. I now entertain myself by seeing how bewildered, and bewildering, they can be.

My trip to Road Runner in Anaheim did not give me that sort of entertainment. Rather, I had one of the most enjoyable service experiences of my life.

I went to Road Runner to get a gait analysis and see which shoes their fitter recommended for me. My Fit Expert was Mary (real name withheld since she has such an unusual name, it would be easy to pick her out).

Before I go into my shopping experience, let me say that the store was not all that big. Much smaller than I pictured. On the other hand, how much room do you need to hold a bunch of shorts, shirts and shoes? I really expected more of their on line presence to be at the store. There are many more products available on the web site.

Mary, and another girl (whose name I failed to get), greeted me warmly and allowed me to look around without getting in my way. Unfortunately, the looking around only took about 2 minutes.

I asked Mary if she could do a gait analysis for me. She carefully explained what all the machines were looking at. I have lots of questions. She probably was glad to have someone ask the questions. Otherwise she has all this knowledge that she does not get to share with others. It is not like a group of girls get together on Friday night and talk about pronation, motion control and the collapsing of the metatarsals from heel strike to toe off.

She showed me shoes that were my size and fit (stability plus). She explained all the details as to why she chose that style of shoe for me. She then told me a bit about each of the shoes in the category. She showed me 2 different models. One in my preferred brand, New Balance, and another one from Saucony. The NB 1222 was a good fit and felt very much like my NB 857s that I just bought. The Saucony shoes were the Hurricane 9. They felt a bit lighter, but still very sturdy.

I ended up with the Sauconys. That will give me a different manufacturer that I can test out and it will give my feet a break from potentially running in the same shoe all the time.

I bought a few other things in the store and had a bizillion questions about various items.

When I was done, I told Mary that I was looking for a particular store near her location. She did not know where it was, but took the time to look it up on the Internet for me. I have never had anyone go out of their way like Mary and the other girl who helped me today at RR Sports.

I wrote a letter to their manager. It is quoted below. I will let you know what the manager has to say about his workers.

Manager, Road Runner Anaheim,
I want to tell you what a wonderful experience I had in your store today.

I live in Mexico and have not yet found a store that sells running shoes in my size there. I was thrilled when I found out last week that I was taking a trip to California and that you had retail locations. I recently (April) bought a pair of shoes through the Road Runner website, but wanted to get a gait analysis today and possibly a second pair of shoes so that I would be set for a while.

The two ladies who helped me with my shoe purchase were phenomenal. While “Mary” was helping me pick out shoes, she was very interested in answering my questions. And I had a lot. When she had questions of her own, or did not know the answers to my questions, she was willing to get help from your other staff members. That gave me even more confidence that I was getting the best help that was available.

I did not get the name of the other lady who helped me, but she was equally interested in helping me have a good experience in your store. It thrilled me more than she will know that when I asked for a product that you did not carry, she wrote that down and said she would try to see if you could stock that in the store. As a customer, I felt as though my comments were being taken seriously. Thank you.

Your staff is doing a great job. My two other encounters with RR Sports were equally satisfying. Both of those were with the Internet division. The people there were able to help me pick the closest store to my location so that I could make best use of my limited time while here in your area.

Thank you to you and your staff.

Information that is non-informative

It is very nice that in our town the running community is very active. We have a race (or two) every weekend here. Races are free or cheap (the most I have paid is $2.70 US for a race).

But getting race information seems to be a closely guarded secret. Though I have been to multiple races and have a few friends in the running community, I still have not found the secret as to how hundreds of people each week can show up for a race that does not advertise.

Yesterday I found out there was a race going on only because, as I was driving around town, I got stopped by the police escort to allow the runners to go past.

There was a message written Friday which was on the running community mailing list. It said, “I read that the PGR race is tomorrow, but I also heard that Sunday is the FALCO race. Can someone confirm that?”

The reply: “You have the information correct.”

What kind of help is that? What on earth does PGR mean? FALCO? That says nothing about when nor where these races are except that they are on Saturday and Sunday.

I have been told over and over that “all” the racing community information can be found on a physical bulletin board at one of the stadiums in town. Fortunately it is the stadium where I have my football practice and I often run there when I need a shady running spot. So I pass by the bulletin board many times a week. I have been looking over the last few weeks at races. The most recent race information was a hand written note. In essence it said “The (I don’t remember the initials, but perhaps it was the FALCO race) FALCO race will be held.” No time, place nor date information on the note. It was assumed that everyone would know the details.

The most recent marathon run here in town I did not even know about it until the following day. How do you have only 2 marathons a year and have total lack of advertisement? The race directors lamented about it last year because there were so few people who ran. I can take a guess as to why. Marathons need to be advertised heavily a year in advance. This gives people time to plan for them. This particular marathon is a yearly event. But for people who are new to racing or new to the area (they expect our city population to double within 6 years!), need to know about these annual events even though the regulars already know about them.

As active as the running community is, they sure do a poor job of putting on races.

Sad, sad times

I had posted a few weeks ago about the joy and excitement I felt over getting a source of Diet Dr Pepper. I ran out of the last one that I had been hoarding a couple of days ago. We were able to get them pretty readily for a while. My wife would grab 10-15 each time she saw them in the store, whether we had a ton of them or not.

It has been well over a week since any sightings have been made. *Sniff*

I can guarantee it is not because there was too much stock sitting on the shelves not being sold. Each time we would see them there would just be a few. My wife was gracious to the other people in town and would try to leave 3 or 4 for them. Then she would call everyone she knew and tell them that there were some still on the shelves. So, I know they sold well.

When we were in the country of Granada (an island in the Eastern Caribbean), the missionary there told us a great story. The stores would stock stuff unless it got to be popular. When it became popular that would create too much work trying to keep the shelves stocked, so they would pull the product. I think they forgot to teach supply and demand in their economics classes there.

For now, we are Diet Dr Pepper-less. Maybe sometime soon we will get more. We were told they did the same thing with Mt. Dew. Except it was around long enough to be sold in the mom and pop convenience stores. Then one day, it just all disappeared. Hopefully that is not the case with the Diet Dr Pepper. Maybe they did a test batch and found out that it went over well and now they are ramping up production to be able to supply all the stores in the country. Yes, that must be it. Or, that is at least what I choose to believe.