Why Customers Hate Shopping ... A quick survey of Australian shoppers

Here is what customers say ‘bore’ or ‘irritate’ them about shopping

Finding a car space ... and then finding your car once you’re ‘done’ shopping

Wonky shopping trolleys

Waiting in Line

The temperature is too hot or too cold

The shop is too bright or too dark

All I can say to clothing retailers is lighting, lighting, lighting... I won’t buy if they look grey/green/washed out...

“”

Bland walls, bland colour, bland service.

I need to be engaged visually and not tormented aurally.

Retailers stocking the same thing as every other retailer.

Find some differentiation and a reason I must go into your shop

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The music is too LOUD or too beige

I am deeply resentful when ignored

Staff who don’t acknowledge you, who continue their conversations rather than serve you.

Staff who look you up and down and judge you as not worthy of conversation, attention, lacking in some way....

Bored with staff getting bored. I go in excited to spend some $ ... Feel a bit stupid when they are bored with my choices. ”

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Lots of women loathe buying underwear, lingerie or swimwear

Would rather poke my eyes out with a fork. I tend to go for known retailers and wait as long as possible.

If the experience was better I would purchase at more regular intervals.

I hate it with a passion.

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And men say:

I love it when a shop gives me a place to sit and read or the like. Then I’m happy to let Suzi spend all the time in the world...

Never enough chairs or reading material!“

”

“Waiting rooms with either no magazines or old, dog-eared out of date reading material and dreadful instant

coffee ... if that. ”

Give me a waiting room with current magazines and

newspapers, real coffee (NOT instant) and cold water and I’ll be

your customer forever....

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Salespeople who talk too much. Too busy “pitching” to listen...

Not listening. (This is the most cited reason customers dislike

salespeople.)

Salespeople who don’t ‘know their stuff’...

People on script.Seems so plastic and fake.Would much rather be treated like a real person rather than be ‘served’

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How DARE I expect people to be grateful I’m choosing their shop and not the one next door!

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People who ‘supposedly’ run a business and yet constantly groan and moan about their customers and/or their woes over facebook or twitter.

Don’t they know it wrecks my perception of their business?

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Got comments?

Let’s talk!

Twitter: @debratemplarFacebook: www.facebook.com/debratemplarwww.facebook.com/thetemplargroupwebsite: www.thetemplargroup.com.au

Pics from istockphoto.com and Debra Templar