Pretty Woman Moment

[JuliaRobHurts]

DH and I were at a homebuilding and renovation show yesterday as we're in the middle of an extension project. Specifically we 're on the hunt for a new front door and while looking around one of the vendors we had a "pretty women" moment.

We had a look at the various products on show before trying to get the attention of one of the representatives who appeared to be avoiding our gaze. Eventually she approached and I said 'hi, we're interested in bespoke front doors and quite like this one on show'.

Without asking our budget or any of our requirements she went into a spiel about how the doors were very expensive, how they were imported from Lithuania and the import charge was also expensive, all the while wincing as she was saying it. She then said we might be better off with a more mass manufactured door. I was absolutely stunned at her condescending tone. She hadn't asked a single question about what we were looking for.

I was so close to confronting her about her approach, but held back. DH calmly told her her sales pitch needs some work and we walked away, but I was fuming. We were both dressed smart/casually so the only thing I can think is she guaged our age (late thirties) and made an assumption we couldn't afford it (even though we can).

WWYD in that situation? I'm half inclined to email the company and provide feedback on our experience but I also don't know if it's worth the energy.

Would love to hear if anyone that's had a similar experience but DID confront the rude person as I'm still annoyed I didn't give her a piece of my mind.

That seems to be what happens to everyone else in these situations but the exception proves the rule.

Recently I am finding sales people with just poor manners. I’d let head office know. It’s appalling. I just had an appointment with a kitchen designer - he was a no show. His colleague (clearly very new and inexperienced) did not even ask to see the kitchen space (I told him we had the plans with us); not a single question about how we live/what we use the kitchen for. And I have to trust that this person will give me the kitchen of my dreams? Even if by some miracle he manages to create a reasonable kitchen, we will not be buying it from them.

From the title I was expecting a far juicier post than one about doors 😂

Then she could have said they were a trade company

We wanted to buy matching luxury watches for our 10th wedding anniversary and the only shop in town that sold them was a “long-established family jewellery business”. For that, read snobby. Grandfather, father, son and daughter-in-law, all behind the counter judging you from head to toe.

We’d done our research and the choice was between two models. They obviously thought we were just browsing and treated us with barely concealed contempt. So I looked the woman straight in the eye and said “We’re looking to buy both watches, today, in cash…”.

Never seen anybody jump to attention so fast!

I'd be so tempted to contact the CEO and say you've taken your business elsewhere. And change your email signature to suggest you're a growing firm of housebuilders...

I went into an electronics shop looking for a podcast microphone once (many years ago), got told, “We do have one but it’s very expensive.”
To this day I still have no idea what they considered expensive!

good grief.. tbh, it's not THAT expensive.. we had similar with our front door.. we could afford that easily, but had no intention of paying that much. We ended up paying £1800 for ours.

This happened to me at an art show. There was a man selling large metal sculptures who took the piss out of me, saying that I couldn't afford it, but could afford one of the smaller sculptures.

We were looking for something to put on our 10 acres of woodland, so were actually in the market for his art, and were probably in a minority.

We didn't buy anything from him. He talked himself out of a sale. Idiot. I didn't say anything but wish I had.

Where she goes into the shop and is told they don’t have anything for her to buy.

@ThatMintMember He particularly enjoys wearing very childish tshirts on days when we're making big purchases

I like the sound of him! 😄

You should have bought them elsewhere and returned with them to the snooty family business and gone: „Biiig mistake - huuge!!!“ 😂😂😂

Have you watched the movie?

That reminded me of getting my (inherited) Omega watch fixed at some big luxury jewellery store place. I just went there because it was big and handy.

I went to the Omega counter and explained what I needed. The sales assistant looked over my watch and sniffed, “It’s an old one.” I just said mildly, “It was my grandmother’s,” but I was dying to make some comment along the lines of, you mean people actually buy these watches new? How amusing! 😂

My dad famously tells a story about a friend of his who owned an engineering firm, and went to buy a car. He was a shop floor kind of guy, so had overalls on when he went car shopping.

The Porsche garage didn't give him the time of day, in his overalls. But the Ferrari garage did 😂

I like to think he want back to the Porsche garag in his Ferrari and said, big mistake, huge!!! But I doubt he did

Be content that as a sales person she is a complete failure- as a sales person you just CANNOT make assumptions about anyone's spending power. They do it because they don't want to put effort in if you don't turn out to have the money- but it's the wrong approach, have your time wasted most of the time is part of the job.

Aren't a lot of these things showcases for b2b trade? Are you sure she wasn't just telling you that it was impractical for a sole purchase?

Many years ago, I went shopping with my mum for a trench coat - at that time, very on trend.

I tried one one and said, "Hmm. It's a bit tight across the chest. Can I try a 14?" and the sales assistant replied, "Oh, you won't find a size 14. Not in London."

She clearly had us marked as country bumpkins having a day out in Oxford St. (It was Dickens & Jones back in the 1980s so its glory days were long gone).

Similar happened to my parents years ago. My dad was a farmer so probably not the smartest looking bloke but didn't have his scruffs on. The salesperson showed them some products and made a comment about how they probably couldn't afford those ones. Ironic thing is they had cash in the bank to pay upfront. They didn't say anything sadly but walked out.

This happens to me a lot. I don’t dress to impress (well most of the time) and certainly not when shopping.

We needed new sofas and for some reason my PIL were with us. I think maybe they had something to do on that out of town trading estate too. Anyway, DH and I were first in and it's one of those massive chain stores. We started looking round, only looking at sofas and with focus because we bloody hate those places and shopping, we wanted it done. We were early 30s maybe. Pointedly ignored by sales staff. ILs walk in few minutes later and the sales person zoomed past us to them. They of course said they were with us and we were the customers. We said no, not anymore and left.

I don't get it! How many couples in their 30s spend their weekends driving to awkward to get to furniture places and wondering round just for fun? Compared to the number of couples buying and kitting out their first home and therefore really needing sofas?

I’ve had an experience very recently though not so much to do with not being able to afford said item but that as a little “woman” didn’t really know my finances.

Went a few weeks ago to order a new car. Same make and model as the previous 3 cars I’ve purchased. Would be seen as a premium model of car. Went to the same dealership as I had purchased the previous cars from but the salesman I had dealt with for the other sales no longer worked there so I was introduced to “Steve”. Steve was a condescending twat and from the moment we met acted as if he was doing me a favour selling me a car. I queried the trade in value he gave for me car as I felt (correctly) it was too low. He was only short of patting me on the head while he mansplained to me about trade because I didn’t understand car values. He also when printing the quote added on two extras which I hadn’t requested which added approx 2K to the price of the car. Probably thought I was too stupid to notice. The final straw was when I again challenged the costings he told me maybe I needed to go home and discuss with my husband what I could afford (ignoring the fact this was my fourth time buying this car so was obviously a serious customer). I thanked him for his time, got into my car and drove 30 mins to the next dealership where I ordered a car that very afternoon. I think it was a combination of my being a woman and also an assumption that just because I was a repeat customer the sale was in the bag

The dealership emailed me last week to enquire if I was still interested with offers of assistance in purchasing a new vehicle. I very politely emailed back to explain I’d purchased elsewhere and I didn’t believe a person of my gender was a good fit for the sales person I was partnered with on the day. Radio silence since then but I like to think there was at least some questions asked of Steve’s sales technique

She can’t afford it because she’s looks like (and is a) prostitute. But then the bloke goes out with her and funds her lifestyle I think, so now she can afford it. I might have this wrong. But it’s still his money funding it I think….

I've had it on a few occasions as I'm a bit of a scruff (although not recently tbf) but my most notable judgement was when i went to a "prestigious" jeweller in Scotland and heard the head sales woman at the time, now retired and a vision in tweed, instructing the security guard to "keep an eye" on me.
I was in jeans, hoodie and converse.

She came up to me with the up and down look of "what is this shit upon my beautiful carpet" and was physically blocking my access to the rear of the showroom where the "significant" luxury watches were displayed. If i moved to sidestep her, she would sidestep and literally said to me "I don't think there's anything for you down there."

Watchmaker clocked what was going on as his department had a glass front overlooking the showroom and shot out to intercept the escalating war and told her that "Ms XXX is here to collect her FOUR XXX's from service so perhaps you'd like to offer her a drink while she waits."

Delicious.

This made me laugh. My late husband worked for Raymarine and hated boats, and particularly hated having to go to the boat show. He said it was really embarrassing being on the stand and having to ask someone else to help when a prospective customer approached. They always assumed that he was the expert as he was the oldest person there!