Regular customer demands retail worker stop smiling and drop her cheerful customer service act, she complies, leaving the customer to deal with the uncomfortable reality of her request: '[I] would stop even smiling as she'd approach the counter'

It has often been said that there's no pleasing everyone, and that attempting to do so is a futile effort. However, when you're expected to please people as part of your job, you're almost caught up in an expectation of doing what is impossible.

And that is customer service, retail, and food service in a nutshell. These industries have high rates of burnout, owing to the fact that they almost require you to fracture your personality in order to meet expectations. And expectations are high, even being a manager doesn't save you from the need to feign hollow sincerity at any given moment. With many retailers adopting review systems where an 8-10 out of 10 is the only acceptable score, and anything less ensures that you're going to be hearing from upper management, asking questions as to why you weren't able to push the customer "over the line." 

There's a reason why so many large companies famous for their customer service rely on forced smiles and canned appeasement that explicitly avoids anything beyond surface level. It's all about playing to percentages and remaining as inoffensive as possible, seeming friendly without opening the interaction up for chances for things to go sideways. And when you think a customer is a "real one" and gets it, there's still a chance that they might turn around and fly off the handle about something or claim to take offence at the same witty banter.

All of this expectation can be exceedingly difficult in the mornings, when you're still bleary-eyed and fighting off a fitful sleep. It's no small task when you find yourself needing to be cheery in the mornings when you're not a morning person to start with. In any other situation, you might be excused for being a little blunt or even standoffish, but when you're in a customer service role, you hardly get that chance, as one blunt interaction can spiral out and become a big deal. 

But, after all of that, there are customers like this one who actually take offense to being greeted cheerfully and go as far as demanding that the cheerful act of banter be dropped entirely. This retail worker was all too happy to comply with this demand, turning instead to a natural, cold, and lifeless demeanor any time that customer, who was a regular, was around. This left the customer increasingly uncomfortable, and while they probably could have complained further and made a big deal about all of it, they accepted that their demand had resulted in their present reality. Definitely an important lesson to be learned in here somewhere.

Author image for Brad Dickson Brad Dickson
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