January 13, 2016
Right around Christmas Saarah and I found ourselves shopping in Kohl’s. That’s not a place I shop in during the best of times, but we were out, it was late, and the store was open 24/7 leading up to the holiday, so why not?
I’ll tell you why not.
I don’t care for Kohl’s because as good a deal as their “Kohl’s Cash” may be, it requires the cashier to take the extra steps of digging some out from a drawer, sticking it in the printer to be validated, then stapling it to your receipt along with the 3 or 4 other things that Kohl’s randomly staples to your receipt. (I swear they once stapled an old taco coupon to my receipt.) Now I know that this doesn’t sound like much, and yes, it only adds 30 seconds or a minute to the transaction, but multiply that minute by the 25 people on line ahead of you during the Christmas rush and you can see why I’m not too keen on it.
But that’s not the problem.
Saarah was shopping for clothes and I was doing what I usually do in these situations: carrying her bags. (I also may or may not have been stealing glances at all the boss Force Awakens merchandise, but that’s neither here nor there.) Anyway, there was a nice top on one of the mannequins that Saarah really liked, so we looked around and tried to find the rack they were on. I mean c’mon, of course the mannequin had to be near the rack of clothes it was displaying, right? Right?
No.
So we kept looking and looking, moving further and further away from the display and totally coincidentally, I swear, nearer to the Force Awakens stuff. (“Hey, maybe the top is next to that Kylo Ren cookie jar.”) We eventually found ourselves almost, but not completely standing in the exact middle of the housewares department, two sections over.
And no, the top was not there either.
Well, faced with no alternative, we did what no man ever wants to do, but will grudgingly do when faced with one of Saarah’s disapproving stares: we asked an associate for help. It wasn’t clear, because the associate was very helpfully not wearing a name tag, but he may have been an assistant manager. I doubt he was a full manager because he was available on the floor, and by their very nature Kohl’s managers are not to be found. They are elusive. Combine the camouflage skills of a navy SEAL and the instinct for self-preservation of a lower primate and you have a Kohl’s manager. (I apologize to any Kohl’s manager who has read- or more likely, has needed this read to them- thus far.)
The best way I can describe him is: He was this guy:
And this was the reason we couldn’t find the top: The clothes on the mannequins are ones that they are out of. If they only have one left they put it on a display. He actually managed to say that as if it was logical and made sense.
So they are advertising clothes that they know they do not have.
I may have too much common sense, but it seems to me that really isn’t a good way to sell clothes. Nor is it a good way to make happy customers. All it makes is annoyed customers who can’t find the items they want. And in our case it makes customers into non-customers. Fed up, we left.
And no, I didn’t sneak back for the cookie jar.
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