I had a very uncomfortable experience at the Lindt store in Vaughan Mills.
My friends and I entered the store and noticed there was no employee at the entrance handing out the usual welcome chocolates. Having visited Lindt stores before, we tried one sample candy each. Shortly after, a male employee noticed us and began intensely staring at us.
Even though there were around 20 other customers in the store also trying candies, this employee singled us out. He followed us with his eyes across different aisles for 10-15 minutes, making us feel completely targeted and accused before we had even finished shopping. When he asked if I needed help, I politely said no. He then immediately brought the manager over, and both of them stood together watching only us.
When we went to pay for our items (we were always intending to buy), my friends asked who the manager was. The manager was polite and explained that they deal with a lot of loss from people eating chocolates without buying. While I understand retail loss prevention, the execution here was deeply unprofessional. If taking a sample ourselves was against store policy, the employee should have simply approached us directly and politely informed us right away, rather than covertly tracking us around the store like suspects. I even offered to pay for the initial samples on top of our purchase.
While the manager handled the final conversation politely, the behavior of the initial employee was incredibly uncomfortable and ruined our visit. Be aware of this if you plan to visit this location--the customer service experience was deeply disappointing. read more