Michael, get your store together! For my OG's, it's no Patcatans…read more..
I visited on the hunt for some spring and Saint Patricks decor, as well as misc. crafting supplies for my scrap book.
While they do offer a good selection of decor items, the "craft" items in itself are lacking. They're often sold out of items. That, or prices are mid for the quality. They always have coupons, but it's only good on full price items and nothing is ever not on sale. There's always sales, and as previously noted, I'm a slut for a good sale. Keyword: good, sale. Michael needs to work on the sales.
Generally, this store seems to cater to specific hobbies and interests, and dedicates a good amount of real estate to these specific niche tropics... it doesn't feel all that crafty. If you split the store into sanctions, about 1/6 , at least, is straight up picture frames. Now maybe most people like frames, but I say, go to goodwill and get frames there if you can. Or build your own? Then the next 1/8 is probably wedding stuff, which I guess is cool if you're in love and getting married or whatever. Then, there's the yarn sanction, maybe 2/11's of the store? The yarn area does offer a beefy selection of yarn options if you're into yarn to make scarfs, cat toys, or whatever people use yarn for. But missed marketing opportunity to declare this area the "yarn barn" Michael! Then the next 3/23 of the store, I would estimate, is reserved for scrapbooking, and the selection looked decent, but they didn't have stickers for Papa New Guinea which was mildly infuriating. There's 7/22's of the store with items for my doodle-girlies and painters, with gel pens, sketch pads, and markers, but it felt underwhelming. I could rant for five more hours about the selection options, but we should talk about the staff...
Oh, It was not great. To start with, on a weekend, only two people were working. And the cashier I had, was on the phone with the hardware store down the street, while working as a Michael's employee, trying to return an item for his personal profit, while also "working" to ring out my order. You shouldn't be handeling personal returns during work, with customers. He kept yelling "if you're paying with card, go to self checkout." Now, normally I'd go to self checkout, but I had a gift card and couldn't. Then I said I wanted $15 on the gift card and he kept saying "you said, $50?" To which I said, "no, fifteen, one-five." - I probably repeated myself 3 times. Not to mention the only gift card options were either "best teacher" or "newly wed" but I was buying the gift card as a birthday gift. "So happy birthday, you're the best teacher" is what I had to write on the card.
I miss Patcatan's craft store. Kids these days will never understand.
Michael, you have what it takes to turn it 'round. Let's get crafty and start making solutions.