So this may be slightly unfair as the owner, Bill, may have just been having a bad day today, but I…read morefeel strongly that your own circumstances or experiences on any given day are not an excuse to treat others poorly. Especially if you are working in a customer service capacity! He was just the type of person to get extremely upset with somone, and then basically write them off in his head. He is quick to anger, and when angered is quicker to be rude, short, and demeaning. And don't get me wrong, he was very nice to his customers, and anyone providing him with cash! But anyone "below" him, for lack of a better word, seems to get a totally different Bill. I happened to overhear a phone call to some vendor or customer service of some sort, and it was abhorrent! He didn't attack anyone, but he made it abundantly clear that his patience was worn thin, as he loudly and condescendingly repeated his demands using the exact same words each time (a tactic I have found people employ when they believe you are too stupid to comprehend what they said the first time) and would repeat the demand or concern at least 6 or 7 times too many, effectively telling the poor service person to shut up in so many words. I do have to say that he never attacked anyone overtly, used foul language or got aggressive in any direct way. But he has clearly mastered passive aggression to a degree I have rarely seen! I also only caught a small part of the conversation, but the way he hung the phone up in his anger, I genuinely thought he was going to send the phone he glar3d menacingly again his hand into orbit. He was red-faced and fuming! I also want to say that this whole exchange gave me an extremely negative reaction. I really do not feel comfortable doing business with someone who is so casual and seemingly skilled at belittling service workers who are just trying their best to help, even if they are not always the best one for the job (we have all gotten that guy on the phone who is clearly counting the minutes to the end of their shift, or who may need to consider moving to a less 'people oriented' position! We have all been there! Haha) but none of that warrants this feeling of superiority he gave off either! Entitlement! That's the word I have been looking for! Bill very clearly believes he is better than someone with a lowly service job, and that they are simply there to do his bidding, his way, or else! He probably walks around saying, "the customer is always right," but we all know they are not! Customers are frequently wrong, and I thought we were past the age where we needed to hide behind this archaic cliche! Sometimes you're going to hear that you are wrong Bill! Or that something is not going to work in exactly the way you imagined it. Or that two different perspectives can both be correct! Just because you see something one way does not mean that everyone in existence sees it that way as well! And if you had waited, or been willing to answer the questions asked of you without preemptively shutting them down by repeating yourself over and over and over and over and over again, you may not have had to disconnect the call so aggressively! But again, I obviously only heard one side, and am filling in the blanks using my own filters, but honestly the whole thing just gave me the ick!
Now, you are all probably wondering why is she obsessing over this overheard telephone conversation?! Why do we even care?! Well, I unfortunately have to report that it was the most exciting thing about this outing to the farm William operates. It was beautiful, and all naturey and everything. The berries were good, but certainly not "the freshest, juiciest blackberries that Mother Nature has to offer," as the website claims, either. The berries were mid, the venue was pretty dirty and dusty, which is mentioned on their website as well, but they claim to clean the spots "most frequently touched" and that was not very evident. The nature part is really pretty though, and they were right about needing sunscreen out there all day! So do with that information what you will!! But as an experience, it was OK at best. It would probably make a better venue for a big event though as well. There just wasn't much to do beyond picking berries. I KNOW! That IS the thing to do, but honestly they could have had more there beyond picking berries or washing your hands, which they were weirdly insistent about for some reason as well despite the dusty outdoor nature of the location, haha!
All of these things added together make it an overall pass for me. I would rather not do business with a man who feels superior to someone just because of their job title or earning potential! In fact, I suspect the white, generational privilege our dear Bill so clearly benefits from is the only reason he was able to get into this field in the first place. Maybe his GI bill, or military benefits... that is neither here nor there, just a final thought I included as a bonus, or some
