customer service serves a purpose

I confess I usually don't like talking to sales people very often. I tend to just say "Just looking!" and move on… even if I do have a question. I'd just rather pick out my own clothes thankyouverymuch. For big purchases, I tend to do a lot of my research online beforehand, reading reviews or polling my readers or something.

But I recently found myself at an event with the folks at Best Buy
and, when encouraged to ask them questions, I found myself chatting with them about eReaders and computers. I was surprised at how helpful I found it. Even for products that I had done research on already, I was finding out really useful info I hadn't heard – one Best Buy employee was answering questions about Macs that the people in the Apple Store couldn't answer. (And they totally were able to follow my garbled tech-jargon "You know, that one computer with the thing? That does that really cool thing?")

Today I was in Best Buy in King of Prussia spending my gift card and I stopped by the computer section to drool over the pretty machines, I mean do research. (I'm on borrowed time with my computer, big time!) I ended up speaking with a very nice employee named
Jack, who told me about the new desktop touchscreen computers I've been coveting. He ended up convincing me that the one I was originally thinking about buying was
overpriced for what it offered and this other one – a cheaper one that I'd never considered – would be a much better match for what I would use it for. Seeing all the brands
side-by-side with someone who knows about all of them was really helpful. And imagine someone telling you that the cheaper option was all you needed.

We'll still do lots of research online when we're making a big purchase, but I'm now convinced that actually going into a store and talking to someone who knows about the different options is totally worth it. 

disclosure: i received a gift card from Best Buy at the event i mentioned, which is what i was there to spend (hee hee!), but i was not compensated financially for this post.