For the longest time when I started working at my current job, I would stop in the morning at a corner store here. Every morning. I was drinking that Monster energy drink daily at the time and stopped to get it there each day. When I broke the habit of drinking those, I started getting grief from the store owner because I wasn’t coming in as often. His usual, “See you tomorrow!” became, “wrong time! wrong time! we don’t see you in the morning no more?” and so on…

At first I took it with a smile, thought it was nice that he was so friendly, yada yada. But then one day it struck me that I didn’t owe him my business and it started getting on my nerves. It’s one thing to be friendly but it’s a whole different thing to be annoying and act like someone should be patronizing your business every day.

I got so annoyed with it that I hardly go anymore. I stopped in this morning because I needed a drink for later in the day and he was polite and asked after my family. Nice, but I think fortunately and finally I’ve fallen into the different category of shopper. The occasional shopper. He did ask me if I drink coffee and I said no (one of his tactics to try to get me there each day, for free coffee).

I do drink coffee, but I don’t want it from his store because I don’t know how fresh it is. The coffee I have at work I make, so I know how fresh it is, and it’s how I like it, and it’s also free.

Have you ever decided to stop shopping somewhere because of something the staff has done?