This is great news for me because it basically means that every store here is like Walmart! Low low prices. I went exploring a couple of days ago and found a supermarket fairly similar to Walmart, but noticed some very distict differences.
Let's look at some of the differences of Walmart and Zendo Super Market:
Parking
The parking at Walmart is crazy at best. There are always tons of cars already parked and chances are if you find a parking spot near an entrance, it just means that the entrance is probably locked and you are at Walmart too early (come on Walmart... you can open the west entrance at 6:00am).
The parking at Zendo is not crazy at all because; well, there is no parking. It is just a shop on the side of a road. I have no idea where people are coming from, but there is no parking lot anywhere to be found. Fortunately for me, I walk so I don't need parking. I get the impression, that most people going to shop there only pick up a few things that are needed for the day (and there are A LOT of people who shop there).
Layout
The layout with Zendo and Walmart is similar and it is not too difficult to find your way around the place. The main difference is how compact everything is in Zendo. Finding your way around the store in a shopping cart would be difficult (good thing the shopping carts are half the size). I think that is very common with China (and probably all Asian countries... perhaps any country that is not the US actually), everything is much more compact. Even the Zendo shoppers are compact when compared with the Walmart shoppers.
Customer Service
This is where things start getting really weird. At Walmart, you are greeting at the front door and at that point, you are basically on your own. If you want help, you find someone and you go ask them. Depending on the time of the day you go, you may or may not easily find someone to help you; this does not necessarily guarantee you that they will help you anyhow. Once someone at Walmart helps you, they generally go on their way and go back to what you are doing.
Zendo is basically the complete opposite. Very weirdly different.
There are no greeters to greet you at the door. Just plastic dividers that you push your way through as though you are sneaking through the parcel entrance. Once you are in the store, you grab your mini shopping cart or basket and head on your way. Here is the trick. If you spend too much time in any one area, eventually you will get hounded by some overeager patron waiting to help you with any question you might have (or just eager to look at you and stand by you). My typical response is that I am just looking (usually seeing what they have or comparing prices). Generally when I say that though, instead of leaving me alone, they decide the will just look with me (as if them looking will help me make a better decision). Every time I grab something to look at it, they will grab a more expensive version and tell me why it is much better.
I have learned that the best way to shop is very quickly. If you can't make up your mind, take a mental note and leave. Go back later. It will save you a lot of time in the long run.
The real problem however comes when you actually DO need help. This was somewhat annoying (and embarrassing) when I went to the health and beauty section. As I have dry skin, I needed to buy some lotion. I went to the health and beauty section (why does this have to be a place that only women go to). I started looking for some lotion expecting to find a section of lotion. After a while (about 5 seconds), I had a nice worker ask if she could help. Not being able to find it myself, I started describing what I was looking for (since I did not know how to say lotion in Chinese). The lady showed me to the aisle with body wash, where there were a couple more workers waiting to help. Now I had three people wanting to help me. I opened my dictionary to find out how to say lotion and showed them the characters. After this, they led me to a small area where they had the nice expensive hand lotion. At this point I had about four women following me around trying to help me get lotion.
Not wanting hand lotion, I asked if they had anything bigger. At this point they decided to send me back to the body wash section. I had to specify that I wanted lotion that was bigger. Eventually I had about six women around me showing me different hand lotions and telling me why they were so good. Eventually I just grabbed one and ran. On the way out, just about every worker there tried to get me to buy some body wash or shampoo... pretty sure I don't smell that bad. Maybe I still smell too American.
So for all of you that think the customer service at Walmart is bad, you should count your blessings. It could be worse; it could be TOO good.
America says hi. I'm glad you have this blog. It's quite lovely. :)
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