Bones

Just popped out to pick-up some J-bars from a new branch of my local shop.

As is typical of these places, you enter into the clothing section, move thru it into the equipment section before you get to the tech-type area at the back. And I'm usually a kid in a candy store looking at everything.

So a young girl who comes up to offer help in the clothing section. And although I just bought a new jacket a few days ago, maybe I'd like to see a Goretex shell. She tells me that "pretty much everything is Goretex nowadays" and starts pulling all these 5000/5000 or 10000/8000 shells down for me to try on. None of which are Goretex, but she insists that "there are all different ranges of Goretex". I'm a little bemused, but I move on.

I stop in the board section and thumb thru some. Mostly Burton, but some Libtech, some Ride, some Rome. Kid comes up and I ask him if they carry Never Summer. He says that they don't because "they're too difficult to get out of Europe and everyone is moving away from the traditional camber boards like they make" I must have looked confused because he started elaborating on the problems with European suppliers. So I asked him why they would buy NS from European suppliers when they're made in Colorado. He says they're made in Austria.

In the tech area, I ask for some J-bars. Buddy has no idea what I'm talking about. Boot-fitting pads? Nope. Heel lifts, any boot-fitting stuff at all? Does your main store carry any (I bought J-bars from them last season)? Oh, no I worked there for 5 years before I came here and we've never carried stuff like that.

Well, I tried to support my local shop, and this wasn't Sports Authority or Dick's or a chain place, but a local store in my city that has 5 locations in my City and nowhere else. And they're a ski and snowboard specialty shop.

AIRider

Working retail sucks. Nobody dreams of being a retail clerk, most kids are there counting seconds to get the fuck out. So don't be surprised if they bullshit their way through that job, I used to do it selling hockey skates when I was 16... I didn't even play hockey, but I lied and pretended I did, and talked shit out of my ass. Most customers are un knowledgeable, so they eat whatever you tell em...

__________________
Never take life seriously. Nobody gets out alive anyway.

Bones

Yeah, I don't expect them to know everything, but since it was a new store (open about 30 days) I figured that they might remember a little bit of their product line training.

Everything is Goretex? Buddy the bootfitter has no idea what a J-bar is?

AWNOW

When I used to work in a shop I had an employee who would tell the customer that she either owned the clothing/gear they were interested in or was planning on buying it. Told her to STFU with that but don't think she ever did.

grafta

Shop attendants need a job like mine where they can sit on their asses and research the fuck out of everything on the internet, even though they probably won't buy it or need to.

Girlfriend wanted pow skis, so what did I do? Research the hell out of it (so did she). Now i'm a pow ski expert (so I think). REAL useful

The internet makes us all fucken know-it-alls

AIRider

Oh fuck yeah. Just last October I walked into sport chek, and they had 60% off on all rossignol boards and bindings, knowing my gf needed new equipment I was highly interested. But didn't know shit about Rossi, so I say down on my phone for 30 mins googling around. Turns out the Rossi mag track Diva won the good wood award, so that was that, got the whole package for like 250$, I didn't even bother asking the clerk...

I was happy, gf was happy, and everything turned out great.

__________________
Never take life seriously. Nobody gets out alive anyway.

icydog

I went to a local shop to buy a leash, so I could keep it in my car in case a lift operator gave me shit. I was surprised to learn that this large ski/snowboard shop didn't carry a single leash. I know that they're not really needed in general or required in CA, but really, not one leash?!?! The large sporting goods stores carry leashes...

AWNOW

Leashes are essentially obsolete, so I would personally be more surprised seeing one on the shelf.

grafta

Our recent ski buying thing was interesting and a good test for the Vancouver shops. Didn't have a bad clerk at 4 shops we went too. They all had the same story pretty much too. Nice to confirm she'd decided herself.

Also kinda amusing to go back to the shop to buy, and new clerk who hadn't seen us before was laughing because he didn't have to do anything. GF grabbed skis, asked him to get bindings from out back and done...

Sucks if you don't know shit and neither do the attendants

Argo

Most of the people up here tend to know there shit. Even the kids in the shops are knowledgeable since the have risen or skied their whole life