Customer Service

At Bed, Bath & Beyond today, yes, I was at BBB making a return, not at the Better Business Bureau, everything was very quiet. It is snowing. There must have been an employee meeting before the store opened, because *everybody* was there -- I mean there were many people there, working, and only a handful of shoppers, which is quite rare in New York. So I made my return, and walked to the escalators past the clearance section (some very tempting items there: especially magnetic dry erase squares can stick to any surface), and was greeted. "Good Morning, just looking around." To be inside this New York poem: Yelp (because this poem is about commerce) and other social networking (including this blog, which on internet explorer, looks not so good) have replaced the old position of the NEW YORK SCHOOL POEM (or perhaps finally given new poets a place. For example, just from my FB today, aside from memes and cute bunnies: ) The eternal customer service meeting, together with a blizzard, lead to an older woman who was confused getting help, a quite amiable person, mostly, getting greeted all over the store, having mini conversations about shower caddies as spice racks, life hacking, no I'm just looking... I lost my hat, so I went to customer service (they knew me there - I had returned some items after all, y'know), and the manager produced someone else's hat -- so I am not alone. And she said, wait here, and picked up a walkie-talkie. We discussed how BBB took over Cost Plus (I have backstory on this -- my parents LOVE Cost+ -- I didn't look it up, no not even on Wikipedia or the corporate site -- because they discovered it together in San Francisco, on Fisherman's Wharf during one of their second honeymoons). Interjection -- this may not be true, and isn't more than an AWWWWW joke, but I asked Dad, isn't this really your third or fourth honeymoon? He said, I think more -- just go with the flow. OK, so Cost Plus expanded, and from an import/export clearinghouse place, became a big box store competitor to Pier One. When did Bed Bath and Beyond acquire Cost Plus? I asked, waiting for my hat. I don't know, the have been part of the family [of stores] as long as I've worked here, but this is the first year that there's a Cost Plus section in the stores. This summer, they are going to start bringing in Cost Plus furniture. This is good! And then, a nice man, carrying a walkie-talkie and my hat came up, I gave him a happy wave, he came over and returned my hat, I thanked him, and while walking out of the store, of course, a cranky lady was verbally expressing that she needed some help selecting silverplated picture frames. I wondered if I should stop and help her. But I didn't. I went out into the snow, and to the park, and home.