Buckle up. I'm about to ask you to boycott a thrift store.
There is a Goodwill store on Liberia Avenue in Manassas, VA. For anyone who has never heard of Goodwill, it is a thrift store. It is, has always been and will be, for the foreseeable future, a thrift store. Meaning: everything they sell is secondhand donated goods. They expend $0 acquiring stock. This is pertinent to this story, because I am about to explain one very ignorant store policy they have...
If you happen to find anything in a thrift store that is unmarked, the employees will typically name a price, ask you to make an offer, or call the owner to name a price. This is because in a thrift store ANYTHING you pay is PROFIT to the store as they have absolutely no overhead concerning the stock. HOWEVER, In the Goodwill store on Liberia Avenue if you find an item that you want to buy and it does not have a sticker on it, the store policy is to refuse to sell it to you. (Is it an unmarked stereo system? Nope, you can't have it. Is it a single broken Christmas ornament? Nope you can't have it. Does it have two conflicting prices? Nope, you can't have it.) They physically take the item that you are offering to buy and return it to their stockroom where it has to sit for 24 to 48 hours before it is priced and returned to the sales floor... (According to their policy.)
Numerous occasions in the past, I have had to hand over something I wanted because they refused to sell it to me.
Until today, I was an avid Goodwill shopper, patronizing the store 3 to 4 times a week. Almost every Monday I would take my 4 year old niece to the Goodwill, where she would play with the toys and I would let her pick out 1 or 2 that I would buy her. Today, when I took her to pick out a toy, there were slim pickings in the toy aisle. She was disappointed but as we were leaving, she spotted a doll misplaced inside of a bowl. It looked like a ratty Monster High doll, purple with frizzy rainbow hair and only 1 shoe. She fell in love with this doll instantly. But as I checked for a price, my heart sank when I found it was unmarked. She had already bonded with this doll and was proclaiming her love, so I asked an associate if there was any way I could buy this doll.
"Nope."
I grabbed another employee and asked for a manager. I explained the situation to the manager, about the unmarked doll and her bonding so quickly with it.
"Nope. But maybe there's another doll with a price on it that she would like..."
40 minutes in the toy aisle had already proven the fallacy in that suggestion.
At this point I had to explain to my niece that they would not sell us the doll. "WHYYYY?" she cried... "Because they are jerks," I told her "Dirty stinking jerks."
I asked 2 more employees on the way to the front if they could do anything. Their replies were as if they were reading from a script. "Sorry, our policy states that all unmarked items blah blah blah blah..."
At this point we are in line at the register and my niece asks me if she can ask again. I tell her again, that they are mean jerks, but to go ask. She walks up to an employee with a cart full of items. As soon as she got this ladies attention, she shows her the doll and starts explaining that it has rainbow hair, and purple skin, and cat ears, and one shoe. She tells her how pretty this doll is and how much she loves this doll. Then I added that it did not have a price and we were trying to find a way to buy it.
This woman says "May I see it?", so my niece hands her the doll. The woman looks at it and and says "This doesn't have a price, we can't sell it to you." Then she tossed it in her cart and walked away. My niece immediately burst into tears. "SHE TOOK MY DOLL. SHE TOOK IT RIGHT OUT OF MY HAND! WHY DID SHE TAKE MY DOLL?" I didn't know what to tell her except that they are mean and all of them are jerks. She pointed to the first employee that we asked about the doll and said "SHE'S MEAN!" I said "Yep. No argument from me on that one." I am seriously downplaying how pissed I was. I wanted to punch someone, which is extreme for me.
I went back to the store tonight and had a conversation with 2 of the assistant managers about their "policy", the employee who took a doll from a crying toddler, and how they just lost a prolific customer because of a doll. A doll that one of them said would have only cost a dollar at most. "Think about that," I said, "You just lost a customer who shops here multiple times a week because of a $1 doll. Maybe you will sell that doll eventually and make that dollar, but you will never see any of my money again."
I hope that the level of my anger at this store is being properly conveyed. I find it hard to express my rage adequately without cursing, but I am trying to cut back on that habit.
So yeah, don't shop at the Goodwill on Liberia Avenue in Manassas, VA. They are mean jerks with moronic store policies for a thrift store and employees who have no issue snatching toys from an upset toddler. read more