Strange experience at gun shop

[mitchx3]

And BTW, why the hell are you even back here?

[Stradawhovious]

Ah..... Just trolling as usual I see. Well, I'm sure it won't be long until you take your ball and go home.

Again.

[David]

About once per year I have a negative experience at Bill's, which is way less often than I do at most retail establishments, and waaaay less often than at most gun shops. It's a good store, and the majority of the people working there are good people. Joe, in particular, is one of the most knowledgable and pleasant people I've ever dealt with in this industry.

[yuppiejr]

Seems to me that the offended party has not officially put in a complaint yet, other than on the intrawebz.

Dude, there is this new paradigm that came with the internet and matured with social networking where it doesn't work for companies to channel everyone into their black-hole "Contact Us" links. Broadcast messages have to receive more weight than 'Contact Us' messages. Joe's most recent post demonstrates that he (if not Bill's) gets that any response is better than ignoring stuff.

Next time you disagree with a politician you should send them a message about it. But don't tell anyone else about your misgivings, your misgivings might influence decisions.

Just because you can broadcast your thoughts into the ether for everyone to read and bully a company around with the threat of negative PR doesn't mean you should. The "new paradigm" of internet social media simplifies spineless behavior like running to the court of public opinion to complain about a negative experience before giving the company/manager/individual in question the chance to investigate and take action on your behalf. It is, in my opinion, classless and immature and speaks poorly of individual character if someone isn't willing to deal with a situation privately and directly before whipping up a public frenzy that is the virtual equivalent of a child's tantrum in the Target candy aisle. Not that I haven't thrown down an irrational fit once in a while, virtual or otherwise...

If you state a grievance and it's ignored, by all means get out the virtual bullhorn and go to town...

[2in2out]

I thought I was the only own throwing a tantrum in the candy isle at Target!!

Does Bill's have a gun smith(s)?

I've never bought a gun there, but when I lived in the Twin Cities, I made good use of their indoor range. I love being able to rent guns and try them out, too. Learned a lot that way.

[Stradawhovious]

Does Bill's have a gun smith(s)?

Yes, and a fine one at that.

[tazdevil]

Ok before this gets any more out of hand I want to address some things people have brought up.

yuppiejr Just because you can broadcast your thoughts into the ether for everyone to read and bully a company around with the threat of negative PR doesn't mean you should. The "new paradigm" of internet social media simplifies spineless behavior like running to the court of public opinion to complain about a negative experience before giving the company/manager/individual in question the chance to investigate and take action on your behalf. It is, in my opinion, classless and immature and speaks poorly of individual character if someone isn't willing to deal with a situation privately and directly before whipping up a public frenzy that is the virtual equivalent of a child's tantrum in the Target candy aisle.

That was never the intent here. I was unsure if there was something I was missing, and how I should handle this. I have only had 2 bad experiences at Bill's, and many good one's. The salesman I met with over a year ago strongly encouraged me to go test guns before he would sell me one, and pointed me in the direction of a few to try. The salesgirl (Jen) helped myself and my wife for a long time on a busy day with selecting a shotgun for my wife, and ran through the workings of the gun again with me when it came in, also on a busy day.


The RO downstairs who is relatively shorter (5'6 or something) and older (50's or 60's) took extra time with myself and my wife when we first came to Bill's on gun rental selection and operation, going over some gun safety with my wife as well. Then, when we came in once with our kids, he showed them one of guns we where looking at and made the older two demonstrate the proper handling of a gun (which they thought was really cool).



Squib Joe has personally pm'd me about this and is working on it. I'm not going to post it here, but I can tell you it was very professional and appreciated. I am not going to post what actions where taken against the employee in question, if any, if I am told. That is a private matter. I can say they are taking care of it, and that is good enough for me. My hope is that this salesman was just misinformed and needed more training. Plus he is young, and we all made mistakes when young at our first jobs, hell most of us still make mistakes at our jobs. So I do not think firing this guy is warranted, unless this was a repeat issue.

[yuppiejr]

While most of my ire was intended for a different poster and this "new paradigm" nonsense about social media I still think it would have been more productive to START with a PM to Squib Joe or a call to Bill's to explain the situation before publicly airing a grievance even if it was posed as a well intended "is this odd?... post. I don't think it should require the advice of the forum to suggest a private inquiry of someone at Bill's particularly if the experience struck you as strange. The unintended consequence is the permanence of what gets written in a forum/tweet/etc. is now a part of the pubic body of information about Bill's floating around the internet, possibly without context, that collectively contributes to their reputation.

Mind you my perspective on this is based on having been "that guy" full of adolescent piss and vinegar when I first discovered the public mouthpiece of the pre-internet BBS (bulletin board services). In the late 80/early 90's dial-up BBS sites that included cross-site messaging platforms that were in part a precursor to the current generation forum sites and I ended up learning how far a bad-mouthing session about a person or business can go and ended up driving half way across Wisconsin to deliver a personal apology.

The current body of information on the internet is far more pervasive and permanent, consider what your perspective would be if one of your coworkers fired off nasty comments about your work performance on a public forum that was scraped and later included in a background search by a future employer even if the issue you had with said coworker was eventually sorted out? You might never even know that the net effect of a comment was the tipping point in a "which candidate do I choose" decision by an HR department that screwed you out of a great job opportunity. Same concept for someone looking to purchase a gun/service that sees a snippet of this thread and decides to take their business elsewhere...

[Seismic Sam]

yuppiejr Just because you can broadcast your thoughts into the ether for everyone to read and bully a company around with the threat of negative PR doesn't mean you should.

I politely disagree. The customer is ALWAYS right!! It is your job as an employee to satisfy the customer's needs, no matter what, provided you don't break any laws. NO exceptions, NO excuses, NO noob screw-ups!! EVER!! If the employee hasn't been trained properly, then it's some manager's fault for putting an untrained recruit on the front lines, and that's and even bigger indictment of the company in question.

And accusing ANY customer of your OWN company of any illegal or criminal behavior when all they want is service is sure as hell a firing offense!! How would you feel if you went into the car dealership where you purchased your car for service, and the service manager blew you off because your car might be stolen?? At that point, that company has totally failed your needs as a customer, and deserve anything they get, public or private. If that had happened to me, I would have probably just walked out the door too, because if I had asked to speak to a manager, it could very well be the one that didn't train the employee in the first place, and all he would try to do would be cover his own ass. That's what an incompetent manager will do. Seen it many times, and there have been several stories here about Gander Mountain Store Managers personally telling customers that they WON'T price match a certain gun with the price match sign hanging right over their heads. When things get to that point, there is NO forgiveness for screwing up.

And yes, my last 4 years at 3M were Tech Service for all the products I invented, and I would get calls for 5 and 6 figure accounts all day, and some 7 figure GPO's, and failure to meet their needs was simply NOT an option. That gives me the right to judge other people and companies who don't perform up to my standards. I do like the way Bill's rents out guns, and I refer all the women I know to Theresa Reiter up at Bill's North, but in this particular situation somebody needs to get fired.

[Stradawhovious]

The customer is ALWAYS right!!

You've obviously never worked retail.

For 3Ms 7 figure accounts and Six Sigma standards, yes... the customer may always be right......... But retail is a whole different animal, which I'm assuming you have no experience with. There are times where the customer is absolutely wrong.

I'd like to point out that I'm not referencing the OP in this case. It seems he has a legitimate gripe, and there has been positive communication, both sides are addressing it professionally and like adults, and the situation is being handled (so far) to the satisfaction of the OP. Not sure why this is still an issue, and you're still carrying the torch. Why not just let this one pan out. You never know. Maybe your day will be made, and someone will lose their job. All things considered, with Joe's intervention I'm sure that the situation will be handled to the satisfaction of the OP.

[photogpat]

The customer is ALWAYS right!!

yes... the customer may always be right.........

Actually the customer can be wrong, dead wrong, so fricken, stinking wrong that its hard to get words to come out of your mouth that don't end with b***s***...but they're still the customer and certainly if you don't solve their problem, they'll take their business elsewhere.

Such is the curse of sales whether it be retail, wholesale, public, private, commercial or otherwise.

[yuppiejr]

yuppiejr Just because you can broadcast your thoughts into the ether for everyone to read and bully a company around with the threat of negative PR doesn't mean you should.

I politely disagree. The customer is ALWAYS right!! It is your job as an employee to satisfy the customer's needs, no matter what, provided you don't break any laws. NO exceptions, NO excuses, NO noob screw-ups!! EVER!!

One distinction, I'm not arguing in any way about the particulars of this situation (customer is always right or not, etc..) - I'm trying to constructively advocate the "let the business have a chance to deal with the situation before making them a public punching bag" approach.

As for the "customer is always right" philosophy, I agree in principal BUT I've also been part of a leadership team working to survive and thrive in a low margin business tied to commercial real-estate in this economy and seen that the numbers don't always support this a reality unless you are running a charity/non-profit. People/businesses will sometimes go out of their way to abuse blindly applied "customer is always right" mindsets to knowingly abuse return policies (buyers remorse, "rental" usage, etc..) or push for pricing so low that they are no longer generating a profit for the company. While there may be non revenue related reasons (PR, frequent generation of profitable referral business, "resume builder" client, etc..) to keep an unprofitable customer there are times you just need to let them go ruin someone else's bottom line.

The current state of return policies at a lot of large retailers is an evolution of the "customer is always right" concept that adds language to the "... within reason" effect based on extensive abuse (Costco, Target, etc..). Most of the people complaining were the unprofitable abusers of the policy in the first place so I think the businesses in question just decided to call the bluff and let these folks take their "business" elsewhere even if it meant some angry comments on the internet.

[Stradawhovious]

The customer is ALWAYS right!!

yes... the customer may always be right.........

Actually the customer can be wrong, dead wrong, so fricken, stinking wrong that its hard to get words to come out of your mouth that don't end with b***s***...but they're still the customer and certainly if you don't solve their problem, they'll take their business elsewhere.

Such is the curse of sales whether it be retail, wholesale, public, private, commercial or otherwise.

Apparently you have never worked for 3M.

[photogpat]

Apparently you have never worked for 3M.

Actually...I have worked for 3M...lets just say that the customer in this case would have more than likely KILLED someone had they continued with their actions.

[Squib Joe]

in this particular situation somebody needs to get fired

That may very well happen, or already has happened. Is your concern that it isn't being formally trumpeted across a public forum? You make some good points, as always, but you're making some unfounded assumptions.