Saturday, May 23, 2009

JELITA it is not! - A lesson learnt......

I am putting this up with the hope that many will not make the same mistake I made, and will put a stop to shop owners who do not know how to appreciate customers that contribute to making their business survive all this while.

I was at this shop, called JELITA, at Kota Damansara on Thursday to get more yarns to make another crochet bag. What I would normally do if I am at Mayfair (Brenda's shop in TAIPAN), I would take out all the shades of the colour that I want, say, blue, and lay them out on the table to see if they match in terms of colour combination.

Brenda is very patient with me and understands my need to look at everything laid out on the table before making my purchase. She usually allows me time to play around with the yarns until I get the shades of colours that I want. I come home happy and satisfied with my colour choices and can start right away on my bag.

But, yesterday, the owners of Jelita (I think thay are a husband and wife team) of the shop were very rude and impatient with me. When I asked if I could take out all the colours of the shades of purple (I want to do my next bag in purple), he got mad with me and kept asking me to list down the colours that I want using the shade card.

When I listed down about 10 colours, she, the wife I pressume, asked me rudely if I am definitely going to buy it. If I am just going to see if it is the right colour, she is not going to take it out. She said that I will be wasting her time as some of the colours tht I want are kept in the store room. She wants me to promise that I will buy everything that I take out. When I said that I can't promise, she refused to take them out and asked tht I just take whatever was already in the cabinet in front of me. I told her, "you want to sell or not?" That's when her shop assistant came to take out the colours that I wanted.

As I was choosing the yarns, Aiman got restless and started playing on the dirty floor. I asked the male owner if I could just borrow a stool for Aiman to sit. You want to know his answer?

"Sini mana ada kerusi. Ini bukan pejabat. Ini bukan restoran. Mahu duduk pegi la restoran. Ini orang datang, beli dan balik. Takde duduk punya". (There are no chairs here. This is not an office. This is not a restaurant. You want to sit, you go to a restaurant. People come here, buy and go home. They don't sit)

I told him that if I go to any other craft shops and bring my son, they will always offer a seat to my son so that I will be relaxed and take my time to choose and buy the things that I want. He ignored me and walked off.

Before that, a lady asked if she could get her fabric serged. At that time, there were about two other customers besides me in the shop. The lady owner's reply to the customer that wanted her fabric serged? "You tengok saya banyak senang ke? Tengok! Tengok! Mana boleh jahit you punya kain!" (You look at me, am I free? Look! Look! Where do I have time to serge your
fabric for you?)

At that point, I told that lady that she was being very rude, but, instead of apologising, she scolded me for being on the other customer's side.

I would have just left the 12 balls of yarns that I had always picked out just to prove my point, except for the fact that I had already spent 30 minutes choosing out the yarns, and also I needed some of the colours for the 3rd bag that I am currently doing. But, definitely I won't be visiting this shop again!

When I related this incident to my hubby, he got mad with me for still making the purchase instead of just walking off. Friends to whom I have related this incident are also mad with me. *gulp!*

Yeah, I am embarassed and mad with myself too for not walking off when I should. But, definitely I have learnt my lesson.

So, dear friends, I hope that you will take a lesson from me when you feel that you are not fairly treated and just just walk away to make a point with the hope that such shops will not survive in this business to make hell to other people.

*note - JELITA means beautiful, and definitely this shop is NOT BEAUTIFUL in its customer service!

6 comments:

Azie said...

after reading yr posting, i thnk i will never enter this shop if i happened to be around the corner. such a rude & bad customer service over there.

... ... ... ... ... ... nik elin said...

YOU SHOULD HAVE LEFT THE SHOP... thats the best way to teach them a lesson.

Natrah Norlin said...

kedai milik siapa ni kak?? macam mana nak maju kalau bisnes macam ni kan..

Za said...

Kedai ni kalau tak silap, tuannya adalah yang cakap kasar dengan saya tu.

Harap harap takde lagi la kedai macam ni hidup di dunia kita ni.

Za said...

Lin, tell me about it! I have my regrets alraedy. :(

aliaajoe said...

Hello za, your stuff semua cantik2 :)
im so interested to join sewing class at epal.
Could you give me the address?

tq.