It’s usually pretty special when a customer hugs you in you or a team member in your newsagency. Maybe not so much in a rural or regional newsagency where you know most of your customers but it’s certainly rare in a capital city newsagency and rarer still in a shopping centre newsagency. So, yeah, when a customer hugs you or a team member it is very special – as long as it’s not weird or inappropriate.
I heard of this the other day when a newsagent was able to get the missing issue in a long partwork series. Where other magazine retailers would have given up, this newsagent pushed and argued and pushed and eventually got the missing issue. Kudos to them. They deserved the hug or appreciation from the customer. They represented the newsagency shingle well.
Every day in newsagencies we experience personal and often heart-felt customer interactions that are rare in other retail businesses. We ought to share more stories of these. Whether it is giving or receiving a hug, our relationship with our customers is special and often deeper than the same shopper experiences in other retail businesses. This is a difference for us to cherish.
We deal out and give hugs from time to time but we are a small town and people like to share their happiness and their sorrow. Just had a proud new mum bring her bub in to show off this morning. So it was drop tools and be a “Gran” for a while. I did have one customer who wanted to touch me for Luck every time he bought his Lotto. I had to put a stop to that when it became a bit creepy.