Sometimes It's Not What We Say But What We DON'T SAY That Matters

Sometimes It's Not What We Say But What We Don't Say That Matters!

So why the chicken in the pot? Simple. Maybe chicken soup should be the menu! Okay, so I feel like that chicken in the pot. And you may ask why? I guess because I wasn't on top of my game. A customer or customers left our store with a big grudge and I was the culprit. At least that's the way that I was left to feel.

I was busy as usual wearing a dozen or so hats (as most small business owners do). I was selecting new inventory to add to our web store and Alison was engrossed paying bills on the computer. A group of three came into our showroom Skipjack Nautical Wares and from a first observation appeared not wanting to be bothered. One of the three were engrossed in conversation on his cell phone and the other two were talking between themselves. The three people, two men and one woman were black.

Now, that typically would not matter in the least, but it certainly became an issue that day with them. Moving on a few minutes into the future, I had selected a boat anchor lantern and chose to photograph it outside our riverfront store so I could use the Elizabeth River as a background. On the way out, another woman (she was white) was entering the store and I greeted her saying "hello" as she passed me by. Now, it is our store policy, or at least the way Alison and I run our store, to leave customers to shop at their leisure without a pushy salesperson nearby at their beck and call. This we believe creates a comfortable environment since so many people come in just to look around, so we leave them to do so and are available when needed. I guess some people take offense to our casual approach to how we run Skipjack as was the case with these folks. The woman that I greeted in passing was the fourth member of the group and I can only assume that the other three overheard me say hello to the "white woman" and took great offense that they were not greeted in the same manner.

The next thing that happened was the group of four left our store and one of the two men was apparently quite furious with me. He approached as I was taking pictures of the lantern screaming and accusing me of being a racial bigot! He continued to say that they were not treated like the white customers, and of course the icing on the cake was the fact that I only greeted the "white lady" and never said a thing to the rest of them. His fleeting remarks was that he planned to tell everyone he knew how we treat black customers (differently from whites) and that they will never shop at our store again. I was left speechless! I thought to myself "how did this happen and what did I do to offend these folks to have them so irate with me?" I reeled back the incident in my mind trying to figure it out. The simple answer was I did not greet them!

"Sometimes It's Not What We Say But What We Don't Say That Matters!"

Today, we still leave customers to shop at their leisure and only approach if they have a question or want to buy an item, we are now sticklers to make sure everyone is greeted at some point when they are in our store. Not that that changes anything to us, but no one, no matter who they are appreciates being treated differently when a simple "hello, how are you" would have made all the difference in the world. Lesson learned. Sometimes It's not what we say but what we don't say that matters!

Want to add to the chicken soup?