I used to work in retail (currently a stay at home Mom), and I had to greet a customer, offer them a basket and also tell them about promotions, etc. We weren’t comission based but if I got secret shopped I would get a corrective for not doing those things and them some. Same with everyone I worked with. We HAD to be that way, not because we wanted to. When the big boss arrived, we basically had to harass our customers.

Sometimes, we’re just doing our job because we need that job like others do things they don’t like.

But, I know what your getting at. Write corporate offices and tell them the customer service you expect, maybe that will change things in at least some places you shop.

I work in retail. We go to class after class on how to greet people and make sure we make eye contact and try to ‘engage’ our customers. However, I’m also an avid shopper and I know what I hate so I personally keep it to “I’ll leave you to it, if you need any help, just ask” if I get the death stare or no eye contact. Unfortunately, some of those same people write ‘couldn’t find anyone to help me’ on customer surveys. We get reprimanded if we don’t engage and customers hate it when we do, it sucks.

I do hate the hounding and would never do that to my customers. I was once chased around a Bath and Body Works by a clerk who demanded I take a basket to put my two things in. I put them down and left and probably won’t ever go back.

Since most of the comments are targeting the greeting aspect, I’ll give my two cents on the matter. I am actually a retail manager in a NON-COMMISSION company, and like Nicole mentioned, the sales clerks are pretty much pawns in “over-greeting and engaging” customers.

Ask anyone who works in retail (especially in corporate or chain stores) and they can tell you, we KNOW how much we are talking to you and how annoying it can be. In fact, retail employees are usually the ones when shopping, want to be left alone by other employees. But, we are consistently monitored by customer surveys, secret shoppers, head office visits that bound us to do more than the bare minimum of just saying, “Hi”. And while us retail employees do not necessarily want to bombard the consumers with “quality service”, we are thoroughly trained to describe promotions, hand out sales flyers, initiate conversation, suggestive sell at any given chance, from the sales floor to the till.

A good example of such “training” would be the Graff Retail Training System, made by Canadian Kevin Graff. His 12-step program is the epitome of “too much customer service”. And unfortunately, corporations eat this up, thinking that smothering the customer with attention would equal to more $$ for the company. However, it is us at the store level who have to endure the very cheesy DVD program, roleplaying activities, and worksheet (yes, written worksheets and quizzes) of Mr. Graff’s “selling techniques”, and then the ire of the customers because of following Mr. Graff’s “selling techniques”.

So, before blaming the store staff in providing too much attention that draws you away from shopping at a certain store, please note that store employees are usually stuck in the middle. We fear getting written up (or losing our jobs, I’ve seen it happen) for not providing enough floor service from the company’s end, or the death stares, verbal complaints, and anger from the customers for providing too much. Perhaps, if enough customers suggest to retail head offices that “enough customer service” is actually “too much”, then maybe they will lay the heat off us, and in turn, we won’t bombard you with “Have you checked out our sale items?” every 2 minutes.

Agree on the greetings – the bookstore I frequent is so bad that I literally have to slink around hoping no one sees me. I was telling someone that they needed to have stickers so you could identify yourself as someone who didn’t need assistance