Tuesday 23 February 2010

I am only talking shoes




Really, I have to thank the staff at Brantano for their totally laid back couldntgiveashit attitude. They paid us zero attention and I am grateful. It meant that my three mini consumers could take over the entire shop floor, try every size 4 and 5 and some size 6, walk up and down the aisles shouting OHMYGODWHOWOULDWEARTHAT at the sight of the purple diamante peep toe platform boot and then conduct 'the running test'. This is a foolish experiment that the responsible adult concocted to get the little grits into the shoe shops at all. The running test is, basically, can you run while wearing these shoes?


If you can, we'll take them. We need to run from dogs, cats, the truancy patrol, and the OFSTED inspector, so it is as well not to be tripped up by our own footwear.

The Brantano staff also turned a blind eye to this:


An extended seminar on manufacturing costs, profit, loss, the maintenance of retail outlets, staff wages, consumer protection, and will shoes that cost nine quid fall to bits after three weeks, so mama can use the 28 day period to bring the busted up shoddy footwear back.

7 comments:

R. Molder said...

That sounds like a great store to return to and doing it during school hours yielded an empty store!

Glowstars said...

I bet the staff weren't turning a blind eye, more like they're not paid enough to bother caring.

Not From Lapland said...

you've got to love inattentive shop assistants. Nothing irks me more in life than those ones that pounce on you when you walk in the shop demanding to help.

HeatherY said...

I'm with Heather - hate over-attentive shoe shop staff. Children's shoe-shopping brings back memories of me having HUGE tantrums in Clarks when my mum insisted on buying me the same horrid red sandels for the fourth time running. Urgh!

Grit said...

folks, the wicked part of me completely loved going in there to sit about the floor holding a lesson on the economics of shoe production.

see where home ed can take you? what a life of wonderful subversive naughtiness.

LPG said...

Sold. I will stop shelping the town centre for shoes for DS1 and go there instead then!!

Grit said...

LPG, from brantano i can deduce the following: the shoes are cheap, easily trashed, you get what you pay for, some call it false economy, they never have quite the right size/style, it is an eye-opening shoe shop, the trainers are cheaper, everything falls to bits, but as the kids feet are growing quicker than i can keep up, then it serves us mostly alright for emergency and short term fixes. clarks are still much more lovely, john lewis still lives in 1943, and the natural shoe shop in convent garden the very best and most wonderful of all. pity i can't afford it.