01-Mar-2007
Iron Filings - 11
Mercantile Notes –
Stopped in at the local Borders Books the other day for a cup of coffee in their café. We’ve done that many times. In fact, I remembered I had a Borders Coffee Card in my wallet so I whipped that out. Only two punches left, I thought, and I get either a trip to Hawaii or a free cup of coffee. “Sorry,” the young woman told me as I gave her the card to be punched. “We’re not Borders Café anymore. We’re Seattle’s Best.” Such distinctions often leave the consumer cold, even colder as I said, “So my almost-full card’s not good anymore?” Once again the refrain, “Sorry about that. Would you like one of our Seattle’s Best cards?” I declined.
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A little better experience at the White Hen Pantry here in town. I bought a gallon of their milk awhile ago and, upon getting it home, discovered that it had an odd taste. No, it didn’t seem spoiled or “turned” or sour, just kind of off – a bit chemical-y or maybe vitamin-y.
Finally, I decided I couldn’t drink it and poured the milk down the drain. I sent a quite polite e-mail to the company’s main office explaining all of that, and then at around four that afternoon received a phone call from a White Hen consumer person.
Very apologetic, very concerned, he said if I still had the jug just to take it back to the store and they’d replace it and even offer me a free cup of coffee for my trouble (they have excellent coffee). Which I did, and received another round of apologies from the store manager. I also discovered that my e-mail had been forwarded all over the place, even to the Muller-Pinehurst Dairy that does their milk.
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And even a little funny one. I took my seventeen-year-old Honda Civic in to the dealer for an oil change and some diagnostics because the car wouldn’t start (actually, I had to have it towed in).
They worked on it for a couple of days, kept it for a cold weekend to see how it would start on Monday, then called me to say it seemed fine. When I got there to pick it up, however, I noticed nothing on the bill about the oil change.
Gushing the usual apologies, the service manager said they’d do it right away if I wouldn’t mind waiting. Okey-dokey, I said. When the car was ready he said they’d eliminated the labor charge for the oil change because of the delay. He also said that as they finished the oil change the mechanic who had originally worked on the car asked what they were doing. “Oil change,” they said. “Already did that,” he said. So now the little Civic has really, really clean oil.
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Finally, something of an odd one that also involves the White Hen. While I was talking to the manager about the milk situation I happened to mention how The Chicago Tribune had finally “stiffed” them. “How so?” he asked.
As most of my readers well know by now, I take a long walk every day, almost always early in the morning. For about six years now I’ve stopped at the White Hen towards the end of the walk (it’s three blocks from my house) to pick up a Chicago Tribune. It was fifty cents for a long time, then seventy-five – much more expensive than home delivery but I didn’t mind. Little rituals are sometimes the glue that holds life together and I rather enjoyed the stop and some funky early morning chatter with the clerks.
However, the Trib recently upped the newsstand price to a dollar, which meant that I was now paying eight dollars a week for the daily and Sunday papers. Went to the Tribune website and found I could get the same deal home delivered for $2.25. Couldn’t argue with that, so the Tribune now gets plopped down in front of my house each day and the White Hen is no longer on my itinerary.
The manager of the White Hen said he thought it was some kind of ploy on the part of the Tribune to increase home delivery. What it had done in his experience, however, was to increase sales of the rival Chicago Sun-Times. Still, I kind of miss that little mercantile moment.
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Is there such a thing as a free lunch? Over the years I have made it a point when I’m out on my walks to bend over and pick up money. The rule is – anything: pennies, nickels, dimes, quarters. It’s a good rule and a near-sacred obligation. Recently, I was in an alley behind some homes, the alley dirty and crusted with snow and ice. Seeing something odd on the ground, I bent over and picked it up – a five dollar bill. Not bad. Seeing further oddities, however, I picked up another soggy mass – three tens. The money was half frozen and messy with frozen dirt and leaves, so after I got it home I washed it off, dried it, and put it in the Found Money box. That’s the first time I’ve ever been involved with laundered money.
G. K. Wuori © 2007
Photoillustration by the author
