Articles To help Project Leaders
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It is impossible to understand the stupidity of some retailers.
I am leading the water-sports event for our upcoming church picnic. I need to purchase water balloons for the balloon-toss competition.
I went to my local iParty, just after opening time, and found three employees in the customer-deserted store. The stand with water balloons is at the entrance. As I walked in, the stand was in front of the employees. I pointed to the stand and said "Hi - I am looking for biodegradable water balloons". You are thinking "How hard can this be?"
(With the benefit of hindsight I should have just looked for the balloons myself, and ignored the employees.)
The employees informed me that they don't carry biodegradable water balloons. I was told that they have never heard of them, and "If they existed, we would know about it." (Silly me for daring to ask for such a thing.)
Well, clearly, with the employees standing between me and the stand that displays water balloons, I had no option but to leave the store.
Any one of these responses would have been better:
1. "Here are our water balloons, let's see if they are biodegradable".
2. "I am not sure that our balloons are biodegradable, let's look at the balloons on display in front of me".
3. "Please give me a minute to ask my manager, and if we don't have them in stock, I will order them online for you and ship them to your house."
All is well that ends well though - I went down the street and purchased the biodegradable water balloons from another store. Same brand and packaging as the water balloons at iParty, with the word "Biodegradable" printed on the back of the packet.
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