it was work...seriously!!

I think I deserve my own TV show...I am the master of secret shopping (aka consumer research). This weekend as a means of research I spent the day shopping for china & other home goods. One would think ok no big deal, walk around the stores and browse...yeah, whatever that is hardly an effective means to getting information. In order to learn about china, flatware, glassware, etc you have to take on a role of "bride to be" (BTB).

So...I started my experience at Macy's...the sales people were helpful (sort of) to me the BTB and showed me several different collections, but had no real knowledge about the brands, blah, blah...but that wasn't the fun part. The fun part was when they started asking questions such as:

* When's the big day? (ummm maybe in 5 years or after I have a bf?)
* Where's your ring? (crap I forgot a fake ring!!!, umm its being resized, he forgot to get my ring size)
* How did he propose? (you know the standard, champagne, one knee, roses, tears- yeah right)
* Where is he? (he travels....a lot)

Ok so I must say at registry #1...I was a little shaken up about the questions and found myself wavering way too much. But I drank some Gatorade, gave myself a pep talk and moved on. It's all about endurance when it comes to secret shopping/ consumer research. By registry #2 and #3 I had a flawless story and started realizing way this may be even too believable for me...I almost had myself convinced that I was getting married and that my ring was in the "shop". Seriously?! Get yourself together I had to keep saying…

Sales people were offering me champagne (I would have preferred a martini), showing me new collections, asking if I wanted to see something more expensive (ummmm yes please!!!!). They told me about bone china, different types of crystal, etc. I saw purples with brown and greens with hot pink...OMG how do BTB's process all this information!! I was offered 20% off at Bloomies (I didn't take it, I thought that would be unethical, yes everything else I did was completely legit and honest- sort of). Oh and I got to play with the registry gun...that was fun! A BTB that was there in fact shopping for her registry let me tag some stuff so that I felt "involved"...weird thing about that BTB was that she had a ring, a fiancé, a date and a registry...I mean seriously?!

Anyways, after 4 grueling hours the game ended and it was a clear victory for me...I did what anyone would do to celebrate; I went to Saks and shopped. Oh and then gathered my thoughts....it was work, seriously!