RUTHERBLOG

Here’s an interesting Euro-election fact (first pointed out by Ben Goldacre on Twitter yesterday): While the BNP took 6.2% of the UK vote, the Pirate Party took 7.0% in Sweden.

Earlier this year the four founders of Pirate Bay (a file-sharing website) were fined £3m and jailed for a year by the Swedish courts. It became a cause celebre, once again bringing the issue of copyright and open access into the public spotlight.

The Pirate Party has obviously benefited from a backlash against the verdict. On its platform to ” fundamentally reform copyright law, get rid of the patent system, and ensure that citizens’ rights to privacy are respected,” it  mobilized the youth vote of Sweden, and will now take its first seat in the European Parliament.

At first pass this looks like a single issue, flash-in-the-pan, of-no-consequence moment-of-madness from a nation that has 200 ways of serving herring. But there’s more to it than that. Watch his Channel 4 report, and listen to musician / producer Alexander Bard:

http://link.brightcove.com/services/player/bcpid1184614595?bctid=25698199001

BROUGHT TO BOOK

In his excellent article in The Guardian a couple of weeks ago, Ian Jack proposed that as the publishing world goes into meltdown, we are seeing the return of the gifted amateur. The economics of the £500,000 advance just doesn’t work any more (if it ever did), and it’s time to remind ourselves that Trollope was a postmaster, Eliot was a banker and Angus Wilson worked in the British Museum.

The total access to a distribution mechanism for both writer-and-reader / musician-and-listener has changed the dynamic completely. And with it the economics.

Hardly an earth-shattering insight – the sort of thing that was being predicted by futurists like Paul Saffo and Kevin Kelly in the early 90s.  However, while we’ve become used to the technology, I don’t think our mental models of the world have caught up. As Bard points out, there’s a fantastic contradiction between  the perceived ‘right’ to download and the dream of having a recording contract.

Even Kelly starts is current homepage telling us that he’s writing a book.

FEEL FREE

This comes in a week when Channel 4 has announced that it will make its entire back catalogue available on the web for free. (So much for artists living off repeat fees.)

And at the end of a month when the Great British Public has risen as one to condemn our MPs for expenses ‘fraud’, while at the same time we’ve been downloading MP3, torrent streams and other file-sharing workarounds. Which under current law, is theft.

These episodes have made me realise that  great content on its own doesn’t make money;  there must be control of the means of distribution. If I can limit access to something you want, I can charge you for it. That’s why Amazon has developed the Kindle – which will change the game again for book publishers,  newspapers and booksellers.

I have no idea how this will play out: I doubt anyone does. The only certainty I can see is that while I write the Great English comic novel, I’m not giving up the day job. Before, during  – or after.

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In a recent radio interview, Alan Ayckbourn recounted going for a drink with a young Harold Pinter, and the two of them being accosted by a man with the opening line:

“I think I may have murdered my Mother-in-Law”.

After they had listened to a convoluted tale of family members being pushed up chimneys, Pinter gave some sage advice, which the stranger gratefully accepted, drank up and set off home.

“What a strange fellow” said Ayckbourn.

“Was he?” replied Pinter.

Ayckbourn observed that this sort of thing never happens to him, but that it was a common occurence for Pinter – as if he was so utterly submersed in the universe of his drama that it was, indeed,  his reality.

An interesting but uncomfortable notion, as the following type of exchange becomes all too frequent in my world…

* * * *

A voicemail today from HM Revenue and Customs.

An anonymous messenger with the warmth of corrugated iron asked to speak to a Director or signatory of Company XYZ (a spin-off company from my main business). It gave me a number and a reference to quote, then set me a deadline by which they must hear from me.

I called back at once. One ignores HMRC at one’s peril.

I was put on hold.

A recording told me that they were sorry they couldn’t answer immediately, but were very busy, and would pick up my call as soon as someone became available.

I held some more. The message repeated the apology.

A little more piped music; another apology. By this time, I was so glad that I had returned the call so promptly.

After five minutes a woman answered. Who was I and what was the company name? I gave her both.

“And your address and postcode?”

As I conduct virtually all business by email, text and phone, I very rarely give out the postcode. I told her I didn’t know.

“Then we can’t process the call if you can’t answer the security question.”

But you called me.

“Sorry sir. You have to answer the postcode for security purposes.”

Hold on.

(Sitting at my PC, I typed in the company name to Google and accessed its website. The Contact Us page.)

I read her the postcode.

“That’s correct. And what’s the company telephone number?”

What are you asking that for? You called me.

“It’s for security sir. I can’t process this call unless you give me your ‘phone number.”

I read her the company telephone number.

“No. That’s not the number we have. That’s not your phone number. Unless you give me that information, I can’t take this call any further and help you with your enquiry.”

But I don’t have an enquiry. YOU have an enquiry. Remember, you called me.

“But we have to ensure that we’re speaking with a representative of the company. And if you can’t give me your number…”

I am giving you my number; that’s the company number.

“Well it’s not the number we hold sir. Could this be a direct dial number?”

Could be. Tell me what it is and I’ll confirm that.

“I can’t do that sir. It’s a security question.”

Well, is there anything else you could ask me? Is there a password or do you have the names of Directors. I could tell you that?

“Just a moment sir.”

More music.

“How much PAYE did you pay in March?”

I have no idea. It’s not information that I carry round in my head.

“Don’t you pay people?”

Yes, of course we pay people – or more accurately, we have a finance department that pays people. You could speak with them, but as your message specifically asked for a Director or signatory, I called you back.

“I’m just going to put you on hold.”

Another 20 bars of music.

“Sir?”

Yes?

“I have another question, which I need you to answer if this call is to go any further forward.”

OK

“How many P14′s did you issue last year.”

I am silent.

“Well, in that case, I suggest that you contact your local tax office to ask them to give you the information that we hold on our system. Then you can call us again and we can deal with your query.”

But as I said before, I don’t HAVE a query. You have a query. You called me. Tell you what; as you hold the information, why don’t you call me back?

“Well, I’ll still have to ask you security questions.”

Like what?

“Your telephone number…Will that be all sir?”

You tell me; I’ve just failed a security check on a call that you asked me to make.

“If you get the information, then you can call us back.”

Err, before you go…

“Yes?”

Are you going to record that I did call you in response to your earlier message. After all, it insisted that I call back by Tuesday, and as today is Friday and Monday is a public holiday, it’s getting a bit tight.

“I have made a record that someone called, but that they failed the security questions.”

So you haven’t recorded that a Director or signatory of the company DID call back.

“No sir. I could only do that if you had answered the security questions.”

But then… oh, forget it.

Popularity: 73% [?]

Every night, as I lay in bed, I think of Brian.

And whenever I check the time, I think of my wife’s ears.

This all started about eight weeks ago. We decided that after 15 years on our Seally Posturepedic it was time for a new mattress. It had served us well – especially our three children when they aspired to Olympic-level trampoline. But the edges were beginning to fray, the surface was worn through in a couple of spots, and hard lumps had appeared in the most inappropriate places – rather like poolside widows at a Florida rest home.

So where else to go but BeddyBuys?

It’s a local independent we’ve been buying from since No. 1 child first stood in his cot and demanded the right to fall out of bed.  Singles, doubles, pull-outs, bunks, wardrobes, chests, chairs – we’ve completed two rounds of refurnishing, all sourced from the same small shop on the outskirts of town.

‘Shop’  overplays it; ‘light industrial unit’ is probably the technical description. It’s a 70m by 30m brick-glass building with a concrete car park opposite the paint works, off a small road, off the main road.

We don’t go to Beddy Buys for the glamour. We go to be sold to, well. By Brian.

Brian has been in the bed business for over 50 years. There’s nothing he doesn’t know about his product, his suppliers and the market. More importantly, there’s nothing he doesn’t know about customers.

LEAD AND WE SHALL FOLLOW

We arrive, shake hands, tell him that we’re looking for a new mattress. He invites us to try one that’s just near by. It’s quite firm, comfortable and 25% under our budget. Perfect.

“You might also want to test this one one too; this is really popular.” Brian catches my eye. I know the game, he knows I know the game, but I’m happy to play. Because he’s so good at it.

We walk along the showroom and try the next bed. It IS better, and bang on budget. I am emotionally engaged already. This is the one. J lays next to me. She’s not sure about it; too firm?

‘How about one with memory foam?’ asks Brian. ‘Best thing that’s happened to beds in the past ten years’.

Softly, softly, he’s reeling us in.

He guides us up to the end of the store, and we clamber onto a bed that’s almost waist high. And it’s fabulous. Brian explains the workings of the foam – and how it forms an additional layer, like a mattress on a mattress. Hence the height.

Then he tells me the price, which is double our budget. He can read that on my face.

‘It’s the most expensive in the shop, and to be honest we don’t sell that many. It’s the top of the range, and was the flagship product when the foam was first introduced, but now they have an intermediate model.’

I’m no longer in a furniture shop; it’s a BMW showroom.

We move from the premium to the intermediate. It’s as comfortable and certainly better than the first two. J and I lay on our backs, then one our sides. Brian delivers his coup de grace.

“These memory foam beds are especially popular with women.” We both look at him, question marks on our foreheads. Brian pats himself on the hips. “Takes up your shape, but still gives support.” And in that moment, J has decided that this is the one.

It’s 20% more than our budget, but at that moment, it’s the best value in the shop. And it continues to be so, every time I climb (almost literally) into bed and think of Brian.

ALL THAT GLISTERS

A few weeks later, I’m in the town centre itself,  to buy J an anniversary gift. It’ll be earrings this year – can never go wrong with earrings. And being blessed with a wife who has modest tastes, ‘everyday earrings’ are as gratefully received as those suitable for State occasions. So a pair of everyday earrings it’ll be. White gold, probably hoops? Possibly stud thingies? Maybe with a coloured stone. (What’s the blue one called?)

There are three jewellers to choose from. I go into Branch A, where the quality of product always seems to be a little higher than elsewhere. I am the only customer. Two women stand behind the counter, one polishing, the other arranging things.

“Can I help you?” the second says, a tad frostily. For a microsecond I want to ask her why else she thinks I’ve come in, but I resist the retort, and explain what I’m looking for. From the lack of response, I may well have been speaking in tongues.

Look – I’m a chap; we do our best, but really jewellery is beyond our comfort zone. We sort of know what we want (in that we think we know what she’ll like), but really we need help. Some hand holding, some suggestions, some examples, some explanation.

In short, we need selling to.

Arranging woman looks at  Polishing woman. “I don’t think we’ve got anything like that, do we?” (Nor are you particularly interested in finding out, I say to her, in my head).

“Might be something over there,” says Polishing woman, waving her cloth towards a display across the shop. I pause a moment, waiting for Arranging woman to exhibit signs of motion, but management must have spot welded her feet to the floor.

I walk to the display cabinet, wconcerned about my breath and choice of deodorant.

“On the left” says Polishing woman, pointing again, like a football manager unable to leave the technical area.

Sure enough, there are earrings, but they’re yellow gold. And while I don’t know much, I know that J wears white. I say so to Polishing woman.

She actually tuts, before saying “Well, it’s still gold.”

With all the willpower I can possibly summon, I stretch a smile onto my face to match Jack Nicholson’s Joker, thank them for their help and leave.

MR GRIFFIN GOES SHOPPING

Branch B is busier. Two young men behind the counters this time, each one serving a couple of customers. The younger pair are buying a ring for her, the older two a Christening gift. It’s not clear where they are in the transaction, but I’ll wait. It can’t be worse than the previous shop.

I wait. I wait some more. And then some more. The first couple can’t decide on rubies or garnets, while the second are torn between a silver money box, a bracelet or a Talking Teddy from Argos.

And I realise that an amazing physical transformation has happened during the stroll from Branch A to Branch B: I have become invisible.

I stand as close a socially acceptable to the second couple, hoping to catch the eye of the sales assistant, just for a “sorry to keep you”.

Nope. Nothing.

I sidle over to the first couple, and stand with my hands in pockets, bobbing up and down on my toes, expecting a “be with you in a minute, sir”.

To no avail. Zip.

At this point, I consider robbing the shop. My new found form surely gives me an advantage – but then I remember the film version of HG Wells’ story seemed full of artefacts that floated. A string of pearls and an Omega display stand flying down the High Street would be a bit of a give away.

I walk up and down the shop, almost doing physical exercises as if to keep warm. I consider knocking over the watch strap display or blowing gently down an assistant’s neck.

I reach the doorway when one of the voices behind me says “Alright mate. Gissus a couple of minutes. Won’t be long.”

Mate?

Alright mate??

I spin round, a shopper caught between the rock of long-sought service and the hard place of over-familiarity.

But the boy wonder selling the ring isn’t talking to me: He’s on his mobile.

SORRY TO BE SO MUCH TROUBLE

Branch C had a make-over about a year ago. It’s on the corner of two thoroughfares, so shop-fitters have removed the two external walls:  Customers must have been struggling with complex architectural concepts like ‘window’ and ‘door’.

The two internal walls are now floor-to-ceiling display cabinets, with the sales counters arranged as  two square in the middle of the shop.

There are a couple of earring sections on the back wall; and one tray (see, I speak the language) of white gold; there’s  even a pair with blue stones. Great; let’s have a look.

I turn to face the rest of the shop. On my right, a woman customer is becoming very annoyed an being kept waiting. She’s expelling air with the force of mouth-to-mouth resuscitation and drumming of her newly-polished nails on the glass worktop. These are, I believe, well-established non-verbal signals.

My eyes switch to the assistant who’s standing to my left, ‘doing something’ with a small box. I guess that she’s serving the customer who’s noiw starting to  look like she’s been here since New Year 2007, when she came in to return a gift.

More fiddling. More tapping and heaving breathing; I fear she is about to hyperventilate.

The assistant looks up at me: “Can I help you?” This throws me completely. Not only have I been acknowledged, but who on earth is attending to tapping woman? I look at her, almost asking permission to be served. She shrugs and gives me a ‘be my guest’ wave of her palm and roll of her eyes.

I tell the assistant that I’d like to see the earrings in tray 60. Or perhaps I ask for the cosine of Pi? Could be either, because all I get is a blank look. I turn and point. ‘I’d like to see the earrings please. On tray 60. The blue ones.’

It’s like being a tourist trying to explain the Scotch egg to a  Moroccan street vendor.

The assistant comes out from behind the counter and unlocks the display. She removes the tray, locks the glass, and returns to the counter. But not the one I’m standing at; the one that’s on the other side of the square. With her back to me. She hunches there for a short while, and I wonder if she’s crying.

Was it something I’d said? Tapping woman shrugs again, and with the same eye-rolling communicates ‘what can you do?’.

I walk round the counter, but before I get halfway, the assistant says ‘I’ll need to put you on the other till’ and walks to the front of the shop, me following, a puppy desperate for walkies and a biscuit.

At the next counter she holds out her hand and asks if I’m paying debit or credit card? I realise that she has put the earring into a box and into a small bag, and now wants me to pay.

“Well, I’d quite like to have a closer look at them first,” I plead.

“I thought you saw them in the window.” Again, she stares at me with blank animosity. I stumble; “But…but…it’s part of the sale. Let me have a look at them close up. Put them on a piece of black velvet. I want to see them against skin, to imagine what they’ll look like being worn. SELL TO ME!”

Actually, I don’t say any of that. I want to, but she has followed her blank look with a “Whatever” as if she’s just been told that she was taking over from Mr Sisyphus on rock-pushing duties.

She takes the box out of the bag, and smacks it onto the surface like a WWF wrestler. A crack appears in the glass.

* * *

Perhaps they were all just having a  bad day. Perhaps they had all just dealt with the customer from hell. Perhaps I’M the customer from hell…

But when I compare Brian’s independent store with the jewellery chains, well, there is no comparison. Not for knowledge, enthusiasm, attention, service, sales, commitment or sheer good manners

It’s what we lost when we gave over town centres and out of town malls to the multiples. We may have gained cheaper prices (and even that’s not an absolute statement), and uniformity (was that ever presented as an option?) but we lost people who care.

During the boom years, most shop staff didn’t have to sell. It was enough to take orders. With high volume footfall through the doors, bringing enough customers with enough credit cards in their pockets, business almost transacted itself.

But in tougher times, every pound needs to be chased, and it will be the companies that invest in developing their shopfloor sales skills and genuine customer care who’ll survive.

And in case you’re wondering – after my aborted trip, eyes filled with tears of frustration, I asked J what she’d like as a gift. And she said a kitchen clock.

What man can begin to fathom the workings of the female mind?

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