Bad salesmanship in the O.C.

[lurkerwithout]

Last Thursday I was flipping around the channels and happened briefly upon the O.C.. I've caught the show maybe 2 or 3 times previously. Enough to recognize the "nerdy" best friend of the lead. Who now apparantly runs a mall comic shop. And the scene I manage to hit is one where he sends a young girl (who looks to be about 7-9) running from the store in tears. And why has he reduced this young lass to weeping flight? Because she dared, DARED to ask if their were comics based on the X-Men movies...

Now at first maybe the hard-core comics nerd in you might think this is a good thing. After all who could possibly be stupid enough not to know that the X-Men were comics first? And to that, I'd answer, a small girl who has never been in a comics shop before. So strike one on young Nerd Friend character, he made a little girl cry. Strike two, he drove off a potential customer. And strike three, he drove off a potential comics fan. Good job dumb-ass. I wanted to reach into the screen (as I so often do) and slap the stupid out of him...

If your job is to SELL comics then when someone unfamiliar with comics comes to your store YOU HELP THEM. You do not mock them. You do not treat them like morons. And you sure as fuck don't send them away in tears. Being reduced to tears makes it unlikely that they will come back and GIVE YOU MONEY...

What truly annoyed me about the scene was that I've heard about and even on rare occassions seen clerks and owners act this way to comic-book virgins. Not in stores I shop at regularly, because they're run and staffed by people who like having pay checks. But the smug, poorly socialized comics nerd is a stereotype for a reason. I've also known people who are even more misanthropic than I am, who manage to bury that when someone, no matter how out of place they seem, comes into their comics/games/book/whatever store. Seems they like making rent more then showing their superior nerd knowledge...

So remember, that clueless eight-year old is your potential 20 comics-a-week shopper. So leave the smug attitude on your online forums and take the little kid by the hand and introduce them to mystical realm of comics...

Comments

[dead-kid-fred.livejournal.com]

All too true, but that doesn't change the fact that that scene is likely hilarious.

[bluemoonfly.livejournal.com]

lame.
i realize that most of us comic nerds can get a little riled up when asked stupid questions, but i'd never chew out some little girl if she asked something like that. she's obviously interested in getting involved in comics, and there's not enough girl readers out there...

and i've run into the occational, "your inferior comic knowledge makes you unworthy to talk to me" sales representative at shitty third-rate comic store, but even then, they're willing to help me out.

[springrayn.livejournal.com]

That little girl will probably grow up to draw comics and there will be someone who looks like that clerk in every comic who will be killed some gruesome way.

I stopped going to my local comics store. I used to adore it, but they've rearranged the store so they can do RPGs there every afternoon, so there is no place to browse. Also they've changed staff and the new guys follow me around the store because apparently a woman in comic store is some sort of carnival act. I used to spend about $50-$100 bucks there a month, now they've lost my business.