To Answer Your Earlier Question, Mrs. Rouse...

Back on the 11th of January, Sheri blogged a story for us a of what seemed to be a sub-par day for the customer service level at her "favorite electronics store."

I did a little investigating, and found a couple of stories that basically say that Best Buy is making a push to buck the old "customer is always right" mentality.

The first whiff of this I got was from WSJ's article Analyzing Customers, Best Buy Decides Not All Are Welcome

However, the best analysis (and some peeks at the "subscriber only" WSJ content) comes from www.arstechnica.com and Ken "Caesar" Fisher. The article is entitled Best Buy hopes to exorcize devil patrons.

In an age where it seems like everyone casts their nets as wide as possible
to bring in more eyes, feet, and wallets, Best Buy is doing the opposite. They
believe that a small portion of their customers are bad for business, and
they're looking to shut them out.

The article goes on to describe a Best Buy approved method of profiling or pigeon-holing retail consumers in their stores, lumping them into four categories.

Store clerks receive hours of training in identifying desirable customers
according to their shopping preferences and behavior. High-income men, referred
to internally as Barrys, tend to be enthusiasts of action movies and cameras.
Suburban moms, called Jills, are busy but usually willing to talk about helping
their families. Male technology enthusiasts, nicknamed Buzzes, are early
adopters, interested in buying and showing off the latest gadgets.

[chomp]

Best Buy's strategies could represent the beginnings of a shift in how
retailers approach their customers. As consumers become more savvy, and online
shopping continues to grow, you can bet other retailers will watch Best Buy
closely. Early results indicate that Best Buy's test stores are outperforming
their established stores by a significant margin, and it's safe to assume that
the trend will continue as they shift to their new sales mode across the board.
Of course, if you aren't Barry, Jill, or Buzz, then who are you and how will you
be treated? Customer profiling has a nasty side to it, one which we can attest
to. It's common, for instance, to be utterly ignored in some commission-based
sales environments if you look too young, or too poor.

There you have it, your answer...Mrs. Rouse. It was not a sub-par day for customer service, it's a new retailing mechanism. I'm not planning on spending another dime with them...how about you?

Now, just to pander to the whole "fairness doctrine" crowd (which is total crap, I might add), I figured I should post THIS LINK to put a stick in Circuit City's eye too. See, fairness abounds!

Ack.