Thank you is being polite about it.
It starts out innocently enough… you go to a grocery store, clothing store, shoe store any kind of store really and you know what you want (or maybe you don’t-and when you don’t or can’t find what you’re looking for there’s no one around to ask for help) but when you find what you are looking for you are super doubly special excited because it’s on SALE! Yippie! Skipping and happy with yourself for your great find you make it to the cash register, put the item on the table and then it begins…what was once so gleeful, innocent and such a happy shopping experience turns into something that when you exit the establishment you feel like a cheap money hoarding unfeeling uncaring individual. I’m talking about what I like to call the “want fries with that” speech that you are interrogated with while making your purchase.
Here’s how it usually starts:
Salesperson: “Hello, how are you today”
Me: “Doing fine, and you?
Salesperson: Usually surprised that I returned the question, heck it’s the polite thing to do! “Great, thanks!”
Mid folding….
Salesperson: “Do you have your rewards card with you?”
Me: “N….” (don’t even get a chance to finish the “O”)
Salesperson: “Do you want one”
Me: Politely saying “No thank you”
Salesperson: “ You get 20% off today and if you buy one more item you can get 30%”
Me: “No, that’s fine, I’m good”
Salesperson: “Do you know you can get more rewards if you buy now, we can set you up with a card but you don’t have to use it”
Me: “No, thank you” (using the “smiling no”* and getting more assertive)
Salesperson: “With the sav….”
Me: Cutting the person off “NO”
You are stuck there…until your purchase is made and sometimes after saying NO a little too aggressively, you get glares as the sales person says in a very monotonous tone (as opposed to the upbeat tone just a few seconds earlier) “have a nice day”. It doesn’t just happen in retail stores. You all know it. You’ve experienced it and you’ve probably partaken in some of the extra values but for the most part, it sounds good and may be for a good cause but when you realize that you’ve just signed away more of your life to high credit card rates and that “special deal” was only valid during a certain window (usually between 2 a.m. and 4 a.m.) you find that your wallet is heavier and those extra bills that you didn’t have before seem to be piling up. Or better yet, you give them your info and all of the sudden you are getting twice as many telemarketers, spam emails and knocks on the door from organizations that you’ve never heard of asking you do donate money to help little Johnny realize his dream of becoming an all star baseball boy or the National Association for Underwater Basket Weaving (NAUBW) is in need of more water. They figure, since you had the money to open up that extra credit card or made a one time donation to help underdeveloped countries read, you would donate to them as well. And so the vicious cycle continues.
What started out innocently turned into a lesson in patience and understanding that sales people are usually tasked with a quota of how many of these deals they sell. You don’t want to be rude but after the third time asking and for the third time declining, you begin to wonder if you really ARE a cheapskate but then snap out of it and remember that “No means NO” and what was once a glorious shopping experience has now been made awkward, you feel like a jerk and all you want to do is pay for the item and leave through the nearest exit.
*The Smiling “No” is reserved for those times when you know you’ve said no several times and the person keeps asking. The technique is simple. With your jaw clenched, expose a smile just barely showing your teeth and without moving your lips belt out a resounding “NO”. Now with COVID, you can replace the smile with a cold hard soulless stare down while you say “NO”. Those are my favorite.
Balancing Cat 