Originally Posted by
TiHabanero
It is amazing the number of folks who have little to none good things to say about the shops they have dealt with over time. I have worked in 4 different shops, two of which were multi store shops in which I worked at all 5 locations, and have not experienced negative encounters with customers on the level I consistently read about on this forum. Even when I go into shops in other cities the experience is always good. Wonder what I am doing wrong?
DO remember on the internet people complain and glow about places, but they rarely take the time to comment if their transactions were satisfactory.
That said, I once went to my LBS (my favorite one, actually), they were out of 9-spd chains. No problem, they have them on order, they'll be coming in in two days, guy just tells me to come back after work because the shipment generally gets there around 2. I could have easily drove down the road to Performance and gotten it then, but they're close to work, I like them, I'll just wait. Two days goes by, I go in a half hour before close, sure enough they got them in. It was just me and the employee, albeit a different than I had previously talked to. Complete downtime with nothing going on, he flat out told me it was just too much of a bother to actually go open the boxes, put the chain in inventory, and sell me one, but if I came back the next day someone would be happy to help me
Needless to say I walked out and drove to Performance, and that was the last time I tried to buy anything from a LBS that wasn't sitting on their shelf. I still like those folks, and buy from them, but only if product I want is sitting on their shelf. A couple of the other employees are great and made up for that guy, but at the end of the day if it is me walking in, ordering, paying more than online, waiting til their shipment arrives, then driving back to pick it up, or sitting on my computer at home, clicking a button, and its at my door two days later, I'm taking the latter.