We have old school grognards and neckbeards. We have 2nd (and 3rd) generation gamers, RPGers and board gamers, Magic dudes and miniatures guys. We have hipsters and closet geeks, grandmas and grandkids, and married people that come in regularly.
We have families-a LOT of families- and we have single people looking for likeminded friends. We have ladies (a very large number of ladies) and we have dudes. We have brilliant, unparalleled professionals and engaging and thought provoking intellectuals. We have redneck hicks (who are stunningly smart) and we have run of the mill regular people. We have young people, just starting out, and we have retired folks. We have military (active duty and reserve), and we have full on pacifists. We have anti-establishment rabble rousers, and those that keep order intact.
Our customers include the typical demographic of "20-35 year old white dude", but we also have a good group of people that defy those demographics. Customers from India, South Africa, the Philippines, customers of central African descent, Asian customers, and mixed-race customers all help us be well rounded and make us work hard to welcome everyone.
What we haven't had until very recently was a fanboi.
We now have a regular customer that is totally and utterly smitten with everything and anything a particular company puts out. He wants *everything* he can get his hands on by this company, and he makes no bones about saying so.
I'm embarrassed to admit it, but we actually argued with this customer about several of his special orders, trying to convince him to buy something else. Our viewpoint is always to save the customer some money if we can, and the guy wanted an item from this company that was seriously overpriced. He could have an identical item from a competing company for a fraction of the cost of the original order, and we just couldn't fathom that our customer wanted the MORE expensive thing.
I'm honestly really ashamed of this. We tried to get him to buy something he didn't want.
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| Yeah, that was us. |
It was only after we talked to this customer and really got to know him and his interests that we understood his point of view. We got to talking and we discovered that he really loves this company's products. He is perfectly willing to pay more just to have the item come with their label on it. His opinion is that the products they supply are superior due to experience in the industry. He feels that their experience is worth paying for, and he is glad to do so.
He genuinely wants to have their brand behind him when he uses their products. He wants the feeling and assurance that the "experts" are backing him up., He likes that can look on their website to compare what he is doing to their work to see where he might be "making mistakes". He likes knowing he is using the same things they are and that he can pull out the directions, see the pictures and do the same thing that is being shown.
We were really humbled by talking to him about this. We just don't value the same things he does, and we saw no advantage to their product whatsoever. We just didn't see the correlation between brand and satisfaction he did, and we weren't quiet about it. His earnest and honest reply that he genuinely LIKES their products was a sobering thing.
We apologized for our behavior and the way we treated him (and his business). We sincerely addressed our errors, and he was gracious enough to forgive us. We started working to make sure he got first crack at new items the company put out. We talk to him about tidbits and rumors regarding the company he likes so much whenever we see him. We treat him like any other customer, instead of a guy with no sense.
Learning to adapt to a fanboi was really hard, because we have to be so critical of every purchase we make for the store. We don't have any attachment to any company or manufacturer because we can't afford to do that. Our customers, however, can and do have attachments, and we have to be as respectful to them as we do to anyone else. The diversity of our customer base is becoming one of our best assets, and we DEFINITELY can't afford to alienate or disrespect anyone in it because we don't agree with them.
We'll just have to pay attention and do what our customers ask.
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