You don't have to look very hard to see the impact online sales have had on brick and mortar stores. CompUSA is out of business, and even here in Ames the Hollywood Video is closing down, arguably because of competition from services like Netflix. The brick and mortar stores are struggling, no doubt about it. Being an online kind of guy I like to order things online. The selection is nice, the prices are nicer. The fact that I don't have to put my pants on is just icing on the cake. A week ago I got a Droid from Motorola. Not a bad phone and I'm getting used to it. Yesterday I decided to buy the media dock for it. I was more impatient than cheap, so I wanted to pick it up locally. I went to Verizon's site and found it. Their site knew where I was, but didn't show me if it was available for local pickup. Kind of annoying, but I'll let it go. I click the "Find Store" link, get the number for our local store, and dial it. Instead of a human I'm answered by a phone tree. It offered me a bunch of options like get information on my account, other useless stuff like that. There was no option for "see if your local store has something in stock." I ended up picking an option like "talk to a representative about a new line" just to get a human. The whole experience was not what I expected when I dialed a local number for my local store. The guy confirmed they had the media dock in stock. Woo Hoo!
Today after lunch I swing by the store to grab said dock. I was a little excited. As soon as I stepped in the door I was not greeted by a person, but by a rope and a kiosk. In order to step foot into the store I had to "check in." All I wanted to do was take a box off the shelf and pay for it. Nothing else. At this point I was annoyed. There were three people behind the counter, none seemed interested in me, nor were any of them helping anyone in the store, at least not directly. They were all typing furiously with their heads buried in monitors. I looked up and asked the closest guy if I really needed to check in. He explained I did, because there were three people ahead of me. Ahead of me for what??? I just want to take something off the shelf and pay for it! I wanted the media dock though, so I started the check in process. I touched the kiosk to start the check in process. Then I clicked the "Begin Checkin" button. The next screen was it for me. Instead of getting something like "your number is 26" I got form to fill out. Are kidding me?? It wanted me to fill out my full name with separate blanks for First and Last names. All this just to buy a media dock! No way!
So I left. They made it entirely too much work to buy the dock at their store. I ended up buying the dock online. That's right Verizon store at 806 South Duff in Ames Iowa. Your ridiculous check in policy cost you a customer. Not only did I not buy the media dock at your store, I don't plan on buying ANYTHING at your store. It's too much hassle.
tk