Inspiration through Irritation

I am no stranger to the world of customer complaints. When you’ve worked in retail as long as I have, you hear a lot of them.

“This is too expensive.”
“Why are you pestering me?”
“What do you mean I can’t return this item? I only wore it 10 times!”

I’ve even been told by one rather irritated customer at a portrait studio that she hoped my Christmas was “crappy.” There are more, but I won’t bore you even though some are really funny.

I always try to remain calm in these situations. After all, I still want to make the sale. I still want the customer to buy… and then leave. I do my best to explain the situation and meet the customers’ needs. But sometimes I have no idea what to do.

Today I got an interesting complaint from a passing couple. They walked up to me and without even a hello began to berate me with angry questions masked by feigned civility.

“That picture on your display. That is a South African woman. Why do you have her picture there?”

I explained that I did not really know why that specific picture was chosen for a display. I went on to say “I’m not in charge of Marketing.”

“Why would you show that picture if you don’t offer the language? Do you offer the language?”

I found it a little funny that they didn’t even know if their complaint was reasonable before they stated it. I decided, however, to keep that information to myself.

“Right now, the only African language we offer is Swahili.”

“So why do you have that picture?”

“Again, I really don’t know. I am not in charge of Marketing for the company.”

To be honest, I had no idea what the actual complaint was. Why was it so terrible that there was a picture of a South African woman on our sign? Frankly, it is beyond me. Maybe I’m lucky. I was raised in a family, ne a society that not only taught me to look past physical appearance, but also would not allow me or any of my peers to pass judgment based solely upon it.

I was unaware of the pictured woman’s specific heritage. I just thought she was a pretty woman with a big, beautiful smile wearing some of the most intricately beaded jewelry I have ever seen. To tell you the truth, I am a little envious of the woman. My crooked teeth don’t allow for huge, perfect smiles and I could never pull off her look. I would look foolish, number one; and people would more than likely accuse me of making fun of someone rather than embracing their culture. But I digress.

I called the Product Information number. I call it a lot. I am full of questions. Eventually I was transferred to a woman who explained it perfectly. I tried to capture her words to the best of my ability.

We are a company built on celebrating the global tapestry. We specifically don’t look for stereotypes on our signage because we would end up offending someone. Besides it’s not about who speaks the language natively. It’s about who can learn the language. We are about connecting the world through language. We want to make it so people can understand each other and learn to communicate. Yes, we are all different. We embrace that. We celebrate that. It’s imperative that we understand others. We are always encouraging everyone to do so.

Now that is beautiful.

I doubt that you will have to field this complaint. I am sure that this is a one-time random thing. But I wanted to share it anyway if only for the message, the quasi mission statement. Hearing it strengthened my belief in this product, this company; myself.

Still though, I think the whole thing is pretty funny.