Victor, I find our local Home Depot to have this class of salesperson during the 8 to 5. After that , I think they get their people from Lowes or Sears. ----- Original Message ----- From: Victor Gouveia To: Blind Handyman Listserv Sent: Wednesday, November 19, 2008 9:54 PM Subject: [BlindHandyMan] Speaking of Dealing With People
Ok folks, so I'm mourning the premature death of my snow blower, and in that mourning and grief, my wife and I decide we're going to buy another one. I found a great one at a Canadian big box store called Canadian Tire, who sell everything from toasters to brake pads, and have auto body shops. I have to admit that I do most of my shopping there, as the other big box store's sites aren't as accessible as Canadian Tire's. Suffice it to say, it was a nice puppy, with a 24 inch shoot, both electric and manual pull start, something I've been dying to get for my wife, in case I'm not around to start it up, and a bit more horsepower than we had the last time around. We had decided to check out the competition, as the Canadian Tire snow blower was selling theirs for around 499, and buying something that large and expensive, I didn't want to do it blindly. I know, some might say that I should, if only because they make their site so accessible, but the fact is, if I had money o'plenty, I'd be on their doorstep everyday patronizing their store, especially since their version was an MTD, a make I know to be very reliable. Regardless of the site and it's great navigations, we decided to check out the competition in the area. There really are only two places that are any sort of competition to Canadian Tire. One being Home Depot, whom I don't have to tell you is everywhere nowadays, and the Home Depot clone that is Rona. It might sound like I'm putting Rona down, but the fact is, they are my big box store of choice, even more so now, and I'll get to that explanation in a second, but they really are cheaper than Home Depot for a great many things. I should also point out that Rona used to be much smaller, until they merged with Lansing Build All, then became a serious threat to Home Depot's customer base. And now, with Lowe's making an appearance up there, I think Home Depot will seriously have to start thinking about their pricing scheme. So, we decide to stop at Rona, since it's on the way to Canadian Tire, and we head straight for the snow blower section. Well, just as I had suspected earlier that day, the minute people see snow flakes fall to the ground, it's a mad rush to the stores to get a snow blower, and today's snow fall was no exception. In fact, Rona was pretty much sold out of most of their snow blowers, and only had a few left over. All of them were around the 1000 mark, and pretty much clones of each other, and we were ready to walk out to head over to Home Depot, until we met the seasonal associate who was handling that section this afternoon. He started right in on the features of the particular one we were looking at, and the fact that it had both electrical and manual pull start options, and that it was a 28 inch shoot, as opposed to the one I was talking about, which was only 24 inches. He also pointed out that the one I wanted had less horsepower than the one I was looking at on the show room floor, as I had the print out of the model we wanted from Canadian Tire. Eventually, Punday advised that the best thing to do was to check out Canadian Tire's stock, and see what they had, and if I didn't like what they had, he was going to be there until 6:30, so we could come back. We were about to take him up on his offer to check out Canadian Tire, until a woman eavesdropping spoke up and said not to bother, as they had already sold out of snow blowers, and had nothing there to even look at, let alone buy, and apparently, Home Depot's selection was limited to snow blowers well worth 1500 and above, and that was much more than I wanted to spend. So, at this point, I told Punday that we had no choice, and we had to get something from Rona, but we weren't ready to shell out 1000 dollars for this one, not when my budget was only about 500, maybe 700 with taxes. Then he said something I never thought he would say. Keep in mind, I have always preferred the service at Rona, as they would invariably always speak to me, and not my wife, like I was a second class citizen, and whether this had anything to do with the class of sales men at the store, or the fact that my wife always said, ok Victor, here's the person, I'm going over there to do this or that, I don't know, but like I said, they've always spoken to me, and not her, like so many other's have experienced. Having said that, hearing what I heard today, just made me want to buy stock in Rona, if only for it's sales people. Punday didn't direct me to any lower priced blower, he didn't tell me that I had no choice but to buy the 1000 model and that was it. No folks, he stood there, and actually asked us, not my wife, he asked *us*, which one of you two will be doing the snow blowing, because it will depend on what model you will want to get. I stood there for what seemed like hours, although it might have been a few minutes, until finally saying, I don't care how much the damn thing is, which one do you recommend. I will buy which ever one you tell me to buy. You see. I've been to Home Depot. I've been to Canadian Tire, and even been to Wal-Mart, where they don't even know how to pick their noses, and each and every time I asked one of their reps how to do something, they would invariably show my wife and not me. This guy, actually had the balls to ask me which one of us was going to be doing the blowing. I immediately fell in love with this guy, and it's people like him who make big box stores, and indeed shopping, a pleasure to do. If I had a man like Punday around me when I was shopping, I wouldn't want to stop, and I really wish other vendors would take a cue from Punday on how to deal with customers, and not just sighted ones. Sorry for my rant, I just thought I should send this out, and if you're ever in the armpit of the world known as Toronto, stop in and say hello to your local Rona dealer, they deserve to have your patronage. Now to get them off their asses and fix their website. Smile. 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