There was this old Chinese guy who seemed to be annoyed as the shop was too busy.
And there was one caucasian guy playing guitar in the shop. I was going for a Marshall amp so I asked one of their staffs to tried it out.
I was really pleased with the tone and was considering to buy it. Then this old Chinese bloke walked up to me and rudely told me to stop testing that.
I was shocked and of course I decided not to buy that. I was thinking why he told me(an asian) instead of the other guy who was playing longer then me.
As a foreigner myself, I have learned something about some people here. I rather not go into details.
So I asked them if I can fill in some sort of customer complaint form and they basically replied in a rude way that there is no such a thing there.
That was outrageous. I have been to a few different countries and different guitar shops, I have never ever seen anything like that.
I have been to shops where they asked me to take out my belt, as it would damage the guitar. They all did it in a professional manner and I was happy with that.
In fact, I could go further and say, that was the worst customer service I have seen in my life. I am sure bankers (in Singapore) deal with a lot more unpleasant customers, yet they remained professionals and far from being rude.
And, I am not the only one, a lot people were offended. Those pictures are a few other examples from a Singapore local music forum called soft.com.sg
I mean look at those. Instead of try to cooperate with the customer, identify what the needs are and solve the problem, they managed to attack back. Ironic isn’t it?
Some may argue that customers are too demanding and expectations are too high.
Yes, the expectations may be high because that’s what the rest of the shops are offering. Lets say, you make a customer complain in TopShop and do the same in Davis Guitar. You will see the difference.
Buying a guitar is not just buying a product. Its like buying "the experince". Its all about having a good time. If you don’t want to get offended then don’t go to DAVIS GUITAR. There are plenty of other shops such as guitar77 or Swee lee so on and yes I am pissed off.
I mean think about it. If someone even bothers to blog about a guitar shop, then there is a very good reason. We were discussing that matter on soft.com.sg forum. Actually we were discussing "which shops u wanna visit and which shops you don't want to". I shared my experience. At that point, all the Davis Guitar threads were disappearing without any explanation. And their reason is simple, since we dont pay for it we are not allowed to even ask "why".
Obviously, Davis Guitar must be sponsoring them.
So in other words, this site "soft.com.sg" is a business which depends on the viewerships and make money by the sponsors, yet they cant offer "freedom of speech" to their users.
A bit lame, isn’t it?
That is exactly why I am doing this blog. If I feel something is wrong, I have the right to express it publicly without any fear.
