When Beauty Gets Ugly: "Gift Events"

Gift events…oh, man. Just saying that is enough to give me the heebie-jeebies. Anyone who’s been in cosmetics a significant amount of time knows exactly where I’m going with this—especially if you’ve ever worked for the top three lines (which in non-cosmetic lingo is Estee Lauder, Clinique and Lancôme). These three are The gift lines. Oh, oh, there are so many avenues I could take right now for the “How Not to Shop in Cosmetics”, but I’m going to resist. Right now, I want to talk about the events themselves. I’ll get into the meat of gift events next time…

WARNING—Here is a post that is entirely in the customers favor because—spoiler alert! Gift events happen…All. The. Time. No, really. All the time.

In fact, that’s the problem, isn’t it? In previous retailers I’ve worked with, there’s such a thing as a Black-out Period. What this is for you non-retail people, is a time during the year where you are unable to take time off because of an event. You may take a day here and there, but no substantial, lengthy period away from work will be allowed.

Okay, think about that for a second. You’ll get a week here and there, maybe two if you’re lucky. However, if you want to go home for Christmas or Thanksgiving? Forget it. Not going to happen.

Now, at this previous retailer I speak of, their black-out period is a large portion of every month. Yes, that is exactly what I meant to write. Twelve months out of the year, this retailer states that of those twelve months, every single one has an event that cannot be missed. That’s one very important event, every single month. Do you see the problem? Well, just in case, allow me to illuminate…

As a person who is building a business, we have a certain amount of clients who are loyal and reliable. This is what cosmetics people do—by the way—we build businesses. We sell ourselves, we sell a product, we sell a service—and we really do want you to return to us. In doing this, we strive to build a loyal clientele. Now, imagine having a business that had a special offer, one that cannot be missed, every single month. The people running the business know they cannot keep hounding the same clients, month after month. No logical person is going to need a refill of foundation, or a new eye shadow, least of all a new moisturizer, every single month. We all know that. However, because we run a business inside a much larger business, our jobs are on the line if we do not call you, email you, or send you letters about each event. We have goals we have to meet, after all. 

Inevitably, there comes a point where these loyal clients we’ve built say, Enough! They don’t need anything else for a while. We know you don’t want those emails or those phone calls—and trust me, we don’t contact you for every single one of these events. If we did, you’d have changed your number by now. Still, it’s our job—and we do want to keep them. We call our lists, when we need to, hoping the person on the other end of the phone needs a thing, or two.

We also hope you don’t bite our heads off.

So, you may be asking yourself how this post works in your favor. Well, at any given time, there’s most likely a gift going on somewhere. One of those stores you love is mostly likely in some promotion or another. If you want those freebees, then they’re certainly out there for the taking.

But let me leave you with this little tidbit—if you seek out a makeup artist or sales person you like, and if you loyally shop with this person when you need something, then yes you will get emails or phone calls now and again, but 99% of them will listen if you tell them how you prefer to be contacted, and how often you want to be contacted. We are not like those clothing stores or body and fragrance shops that want to anonymously inundate you with crap mailings and even crappier coupons. We know your name, we know that certain shade of berry tone lipstick you like. We know you are two and half months into your favorite mascara, so we also know you’ll be needing a new one soon. Creepy? Maybe. But if you play us right, it’ll work in all our favors.

Because you know what else you’ll get?

You’ll get way more free shit with us than you will without us. That, ladies and gents, is a very simple truth.

 

Cheers, and happy shopping!

 

Excerpt from THE DEVIL ON MY LEFT

            “Well, Lenie,” he starts, leaning back in his chair once more. That disarming smile is back in place. All the tension weighing the air is whisked away in a blink. “I know you get nervous talking about Adam and Grayson, and I can understand that. But I want to assure you I’m only here to help. What you’re going through is nothing to be ashamed of. Your body and mind sustained a major trauma, one most people will never experience. If you were perfectly functional then I would be concerned.”

            His words are meant to reassure me. I’m sure he means them. Still, that voice inside urges me to be quiet.

            “I hope you know you can trust me.” Those jolly brown eyes are so solemn and serious. He looks almost hurt.

            Here is where you give him a little bit more, Adam says. We want him to believe he’s getting through to you.

            I feel horrible for being so deceptive. Dr. Duck really is only trying to help. I hate seeing him look so disheartened.

            You don’t need help, Lenie. At least, not from him. Grayson’s words are clipped, sounding impatient. Give him what he wants, but not too much. And don’t make it obvious.  

            You are not hurting him by being deceptive, Lenie. This is what’s best for you. Adam’s certainty lulls me. I want so much to believe he’s right.

            Okay, okay. Now shut up, both of you.

            I look out the window, studying the skeletal trees outside his office. Then I look down at my lap. “Okay. There were a few other times. I just…I didn’t want to have to tell you. There were two more at school and a few more at home, usually in the morning. One even lasted about thirty seconds.” I don’t know why I added that last part. It just popped out.

            I see him perk up in his chair. “That long? It must have been a back and forth conversation.”

            Cursing myself, I nod. My head is still lowered so he can see how ‘ashamed’ I am. Not that I have to pretend much.

            “What was discussed?”

            I don’t need a coach to tell me the right thing to say here. I look him straight in the face. “My accident.”

            “The day you were struck by Andy Brennerman’s car.” It isn’t a question; more like verifying a fact.

            I nod again.

            “How did discussing this subject make you feel?” His tone is gentle, his brows lifted in what I would call concern.

            “Anxious, I guess.” I think about my brief flashback this morning. Then I find myself speaking before realizing I intended to. “They told me my memory of dying will be coming back.”

            NO! Adam’s voice roars through me, full of rage. I do my best not to react to the sheer power of it, but I still end up blinking several times. I have to fight the urge to cry. I’ve never heard even a hint of anger from him—I didn’t really think he was capable of it. I close my eyes, pushing away the first signs of tears. When I open them, I see Dr. Duck staring at me in an entirely different way. He looks…angry.

            I blink, and the look is gone. There’s nothing on his face but surprise.

            Maybe I just imagined it. I mean, what reason would he have to be mad?

            Say nothing more about it, Lenie. No matter what he asks. Grayson’s voice is low, and as grave as I’ve ever heard it. A burst of fear rushes over me, shrieking through my insides. It verifies everything I already knew—that something’s just gone very, horribly wrong.

When Beauty Gets Ugly: "Jobs We Never Thought We'd Have..."

Some people get funny when they shop. I don’t mean funny ha-ha, I mean funny strange (Okay, sometimes funny ha-ha:). Yet there are times a customer’s barrier will drop when it probably should’ve just stayed in place. Common sense flees, choices are made, and we sit back and say, “Really?...Really? You’re going to do that, huh? Okay, wow.”

You have to wonder at some of these customers state of mind when they fully entrust us with such important things…like, say, their children. So this brings me to a couple jobs I never thought I’d have while working at the beauty counter:

“The Babysitter”

Whether it’s keeping an eye on a kid you’ve carelessly allowed to play on the escalator (tsk, tsk…shame on you), or entertaining a kid you’ve dropped in my chair while you wander the store—it all equals the same thing. You made me their unwilling caretaker. And you did this without interviewing me, discussing wages (I charge $20 a minute, BTW), or giving me the low-down on your kid’s personality. You also did it without asking me a single question like, say: “Hello stranger, are you a practicing serial-killer?” or “Do you, by chance, lure children with sweets and candy, all with the express intention of fattening them up so you can then shove them into your large, double-stack oven?”

To which, of course, I would answer no. Probably. But still—you didn’t even ask. You don’t know me from Adam, yet you are okay entrusting me with the safety of your child? Wow, that is so weird to me. Plus, you never asked the most important question—which is: “Do you mind watching my kid for a moment?”

“Why, yes, I do mind, in fact.” Especially when your child starts digging his fingers into my eye shadows and blushes. I will be forced to stop them. Don’t make me drag out my candy arsenal—because you can bet your butt I will sugar them up so fast, and instead of sticking them in my double-stacked microwave ovens, I'll just hand them over with a smile. I won’t feel the least bit bad handing them back to you all hyper and crazy.

All joking aside, here’s what you really need to know. If I have a customer come up, I will be forced to turn my attention away from your kid. At that point, anything can happen—especially the kid on the escalator. Just an FYI.

Seriously though. Keep your kid off the escalator…

 

“The Therapist”

There have been times I’ve fervently repeated in my mind, “TMI...TMI…TMI, wow—totally TMI.” Doing someone’s makeup, or massaging on skincare, can be a very intimate experience. I am invading your bubble, your space. Sometimes, things just pop out. Ugh, I mean words out of your mouth, you dirty, dirty bird—(this isn’t that kind of blog). Anyway, sometimes you tell us things we never thought we’d have to hear, nor did we ever really want to. I’m not talking about general life details—I actually like knowing who my customers are. No, I’m talking about those personal details even your closest friends don’t know about you.

There must be some kind of freedom or rush some people feel in confessing their secrets to strangers. In any case, it makes me start to hurry through your makeup application. I don’t want to know your personal opinions on gays, foreigners, or politics. Or that you think Commies and Aliens are engaging in secret trysts inside Disneyland. Or how makeup companies are adding addictive chemicals into their lipsticks. And I certainly don’t want to hear about your husband’s belly-button fetish…

And I really wish I was making all this up.

Bottom line is sometimes we, your lovely helpers in cosmetics, are dodging way more land mines then we ever imagined. Every day for us is an adventure filled with beauty, bitches (sometimes of the canine sort), friends, monsters, crazies and babies.

It’s no wonder we all go a little mad sometimes…

 

Cheers, and happy shopping.

 

 

 

When Beauty Gets Ugly: "Be-otches"

 

…And now, back to teaching customers how not to shop in cosmetics.

Anyone in the service industry knows our customers’ moods fluctuate. We mark on our calendar the day of the full moon, knowing we'll be invaded by a flood of crazy people around that time. When we have bad days, it tends to be a series of weird events instead of just one single moment—and it never fails, when the...Peaches...come, they just keep on keeping on.

 Now, let me clarify for the rest of the customers out there. I mentioned before how Bad Customers make up a small percentage of shoppers. Well, bitchy customers are our one percenters. They are rare—thank God. So I think it's time to call out few;).

“The 'I-Pretend-I-Don’t-See-You-Even-Though-You’re-Standing-Directly-In-Front-Of Me' Woman”

Yeah, we know you can hear us. You stand there on the other side of the counter, not acknowledging our existence. Even though we’ve asked if you needed help twice now.

If you don’t say anything on the first ‘Hello’, we’ll give you the benefit of the doubt. After a moment we’ll say it again—a little louder just in case we spoke too softly. When you ignore us the second time, we know you’re doing it on purpose. We feel a twinge of annoyance at your rudeness before we walk away. Of course, you could've just said, “I’m just looking.” Ninety-nine percent of us would say okay and leave you alone. Yet you choose to pretend we are not even there. Uh, that’s horrible manners, by the way. Just figured someone out there should let you know.

Now, this act alone doesn’t put you in the ‘be-otch’ category. What does is when you then yell at us for leaving you alone. “Excuse me,” you’ll say, an angry bite to your tone. “I need this lipstick shade in 106—that is, if you all aren't too busy chatting...”

Oh, ho-ho. Line crossed. It would now be a bad idea to ask for a makeup application or color matching…because we probably won't be gentle--and we might get a little too honest about that birth mark on your cheek. Wink. Thank you very much, and have a nice day.

 

“The Be-otch”

Sorry, just calling it like it is—and you know it’s true. You know you’re a capital B with an itch, a witch with a B minus the W—and you're okay with it. That’s who you’ve chosen to be. And you have chosen to be that way. No one is that rude without at least a modicum of self-awareness. You are either this way all the time, to everyone, or you choose the service industry to let loose because you know we aren't allowed to bite back. Either way, you take pride in the fact you don’t take no crap from nobody. No matter what. What's funny is you actually get surprised when people are rude back. Sorry, but it is a bit ridiculous when you complain to management about the way you’re treated - after you just spent an hour belittling the people who were only trying to help you. Come on, haven't you ever heard the phrase ‘You catch more flies with honey than vinegar’?

Because killing you with kindness is my MO, I'm going to tell you a little secret:

If you treat us nice...or even better, if you’re loyal and you treat us nice, you'll get hooked up. For real. Pay attention ladies and gents—this is absolutely the right way to shop in cosmetics. Pick a salesperson you like and stick with them - it really does pay off.

So one more time...Loyalty and niceness = lots of gifts and goodies. Rudeness and Raging = as little as we can give you in as crappy a way as we can give it to you.

 

Now, which way is the smarter way to shop? That’s what I thought:).

 

Cheers, and happy shopping!

 

 

 

When Beauty Gets Ugly..."Crazy People"

Crazy people…Need I say more?

This is a strange topic that’s filled with both frustration and hilarity—and sometimes even a little fear. These are our favorite stories, our party anecdotes, ones we love to tell to those outside our business. We use our Crazies for laughs, for drama. Because, after all, they make it so, so easy for us.

I know for me, the moment I spot one, I’m doing two things at once—I’m ducking behind something while at the same time letting my eyes peek over or around the corner. I don’t want to be this person’s victim of the day, but I also don’t want to miss what’s about to happen. This is only for the one’s I know and…appreciate, I guess is the right word. They are harmless, quirky, exhausting, maddening—and something we can all laugh about later.

If they’re the bad kind of crazy, that’s when I suddenly find something else to do, grabbing anyone else I can along the way. We then go somewhere far, far away. It’s a good thing we don’t encounter those types too often because, in my experience, most times the store isn’t that supportive—or helpful.

So here’s one of my favorite crazy stories:

The day was dragging. Bea had already wiped down her counter three times, even though no customers had been around to make it dirty. She would rather be talking with the other girls, but they’d already gotten in trouble for ‘clustering’.

Bea rolled her eyes. Like there were any customers in here that would care. Like there were any customers in here at all. She sprayed another tissue with alcohol, rubbing the last of the fingerprints off her case.

“S’cuse me…”

Bea popped up, smile at the ready. It faltered a bit when she got a look at the woman in front of her. “Hi, how can I help you?”

The first thing Bea saw was hair. It was ratted, sticking up in every direction possible—and if she wasn’t mistaken, there was something brown and crusted near the woman’s forehead. Bea really hoped it was just a dry leaf.

“I need me some color. Got a date later.” The large woman stared Bea down with large eyes, bright with something more disturbing than just excitement. Her crooked smile showed off a single, yellow tooth. Bea was sure there were others in there, but that one tooth made such a spectacle, it was hard to look past it.

Only one thought circled Bea’s mind: There is no way I’m touching this lady. “Uh, sure. Here’s some brushes—you’re welcome to use them.” Not really, she thought. But it was better than the alternative.

“Damn, you got some good colors here. Shoot.” She grabbed a large powder brush, brandishing it like a club.

Bea was barely aware when the lady began stabbing it into a bright blue eye shadow. She was busy trying really hard not to look at the lady’s chest. There was something wrong with it. The woman wore a bright orange top that plunged low, baring a great deal of her bosom. Yet the woman’s cleavage was somehow…wrong.

“You got blush here?” The woman tossed out, causing Bea’s eyes to pop back up. The woman had smeared a thick layer of blue all across her eyelids. There was a single, smudgy trail that actually hovered above the woman’s wild eyebrows.

“Yeah—uh, it’s right there.” Bea watched, horrified, as the woman dug the same brush—still dusted with blue—into the deep, rich red-orange blush. Streaks of wild red painted the woman’s cheeks in seconds. The look was beyond clownish. And the rapid movement of the woman’s arm as she smeared even more color on caused strange, rippling movements across the woman’s cleavage.

That was when Bea saw it. Her brain had known what was wrong all along. It had tried to keep it from her—wanting to stay in a blissful cloud of confusion. However, there was no unseeing it now, no matter how much she wished she could.

The woman’s breast, deflated and flat, rippling with saggy lines, was somehow twisted, bent up like a taco, her dark nipple pointing up toward the ceiling outside the orange top. It also seemed to rise much higher than the other one.

Bea wanted to look away. But like a horrific car accident, she was unable to point her eyes elsewhere. She could see the lady had moved on to her lipsticks, but Bea had lost the ability to protest.  

“What you think?” the woman asked. She gave Bea a blasting view of her yellow tooth.

“Looks great,” Bea managed. She even got one side of her lip to lift.

“Cool. You have you a great day now.”

And just like that, she was gone.

Bea looked around, wondering if anyone else had witnessed what just went down here. But all her bay mates were busy at their own counters. She felt something rising in her chest, and wasn’t surprised when a huge wave of laughter rolled out her.

Well, she thought, at least now I’ve got something to clean.

If any of you want to share your crazy stories, I would love to hear them!

Cheers, and happy selling!

When Beauty Get's Ugly: "AE's"

Greetings! I hope you all had a wonderful Easter! Because of my residual holiday cheer, I thought I would change up my topic today and give our bad customers a break—after all, those troublemakers need a rest, too! Besides, there was an instance this weekend with a fellow coworker that reminded me of another call out I wanted to make. That of the crazy Account Executive.

I’m lucky enough to have had a long string of great AE’s over the last few years—many of whom I still consider friends. But after fifteen years in this industry, I’ve gotten to see some real doozies on the opposite end of the spectrum. Like, for example, the one who dragged me to her house one afternoon—just so I could help her look for her Zoloft prescription. Ironically, she made me forty-five minutes late for work that day.

What’s funny is how so many of these batty executives seem to share the same traits: they’re erratic, they’re obsessive. Sometimes they hound us over and over and over again. I understand the need to manage someone, but do you really need to call two or three times every single day? Or text us on our days off about strange, irrelevant ads or postings. These are things that could absolutely wait until we return to work the next day. Right?

Hello micro-managing...it's not a pleasure to meet you.

Still, micro-managing is one thing, but add a dash of craziness? That’s another flavor altogether. Sometimes we're even afraid of having our AE speak to a client. Who knows what crazy story or weird piece of information may come popping out? Stranger yet, many of them have been around for years. There's something slightly terrifying about that...like maybe they didn't always used to be this way. Hmm. Maybe years and years of events and gifts and crazy personalities have taken their toll.

Alright, alright. Enough scary talk...

So what can we, the poor souls who work for them, do about it? Nothing really. They may be creepy, they may be kooky—but they’re still hanging on a business rung situated way over our heads. The only thing we can do is what we’ve always done: we move on to something else, or we just roll our eyes and laugh it off—all the while praying this type of crazy really isn’t in the water😉

Here’s to all the laughs we’ve had over the years!

Cheers, and happy shopping!

 

PS--If you have any stories out there that are too funny not to share, let me know in the comment section below! I never get tired of 'crazy'