I spent a small fortune at Men's Wearhouse in Waterford to be sure I was A.J. Squared Away for the wedding in Arizona. It was all well and good -- hey, I'll keep that suit for the future -- until I opened it out of the bag and found that they had 'forgotten' to tailor the pant legs. I had no idea what to do -- I was literally going to just tuck the pant legs into my socks and/or go home early -- until my friends Yum and Liza saved the day with some safety pins and expert on-the-fly tailoring work.
Well, this evening I went back into the store and explained what happened. I expected them to be tripping over themselves to apologize, probably offering me some serious store credit or a gift card in order to keep my future business. But strangely, they didn't. They sort of 'blamed the victim' because I didn't try the suit on in the store before taking it out in the bag (which I admit was a mistake) and they spun some line about how I should've known it would've needed to be "re-cut" because of my unusual build.
Well what the heck was that supposed to mean?
In any case, I have to pick the pants back up on Monday and "they'll see" about giving me some kind of credit for my pain and suffering. Pretty amazing. The way I see it, I'm a spoiled American consumer with tons of options for future suit/clothes-buying, and I don't ever have to go back to them unless they make it right on Monday.
Here are my takeaways:
1. Big thanks to Yum and Liza for the quick help. It saved the day and I had a great time as a result. If you guys hadn't have done that, it would have basically ruined my time and made it much harder to justify the overall colossal expense.
2. I will never leave a store again to pick up something tailored without trying it on first. Forget being in a rush (which I was, to meet the Chief and his wife for dinner in Gales Ferry), and forget expecting it to be right. Trust, but verify.
3. Unless Men's Wearhouse apologizes and offers me something (heck, throw me a tie or some dress socks!) they have just lost a potential lifelong customer.
2 comments:
At least some dress socks for goodness sake...
kd,
Thanks for the support! And here's an example of where customer service is way more about psychology than it is dollars and cents. A tie or some socks costs them close to nothing. A gift certificate may even MAKE them money as it brings me back into the store and leads me to spend. But like I said, if they don't right the wrong, they lose thousands in future business.
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