12/11/2023 0 Comments Reckless records tee shirt![]() ![]() Occasionally a member of staff would have enough and pointedly ask whether they had considered purchasing a new CD player, as they seemed to be having a lot of trouble playing discs recently. One purchase of a £9.99 CD could see them swapping discs in and out of the shop for weeks. They would come back day after day claiming that their previous CD purchase skipped, and could they swap it for this one. Even before the days of CD burners being widely available, certain customers would regularly abuse this. Reckless also used to offer a no-quibble money back guarantee if something didn't play OK. ![]() That could get more than a little wearing on a busy Saturday afternoon when you were desperately trying to get through the queue of customers at the counter so that you could get out for your overdue lunch-break. ![]() I think it is only in 'Very Good' condition. Thus there was always an element of bartering, with customers saying things like "You've graded this at Near Mint and priced it at £7, but in the Record Collector book it is listed at £6. If you were buying something from Reckless, you knew that it might have scratches or jumps, and that the price had been set somewhat arbitrarily by some miserable oik like me behind the counter. If you bought a CD from Virgin or HMV it came shrinkwrapped with a barcoded price sticker on it - you knew it was new and you knew how much it cost. Nearly all staff at some point or other had reached inside a stranger's bag only to suddenly find themselves touching something unsavoury like used tissues, or something unexpectedly sharp, which even on one occasion appeared to be a used syringe.Įven when people were simply buying discs or vinyl it was not a straightforward transaction. Often customers would say I've got some CDs to sell, and then plonk a bag down on the counter, to which staff would huffily reply "Can you get them out of the bag please".įar from just being rudeness or laziness, it was actually a serious issue for us. But a couple of years later we made up, when he had to sheepishly come up to the counter and confess that he had just dropped a load of CD sleeves down the back of one of the racks in the Soho branch, and please could someone help him retrieve them, as he really wanted them.Īnother irritation from the staff point of view, which probably just seemed like plain mardiness to a new customer, was the whole 'getting the stuff out of the bag' process. ![]() He was flabbergasted that I was being such a jobsworth. He turned up to sell some CDs, and I insisted that he produce some ID. One of my claims to fame during my tenure in the mail order department in Islington was really annoying Mark Lamarr. Unless, of course, you'd just had a row with someone else at the counter about the ID requirement, which meant you couldn't then be seen to be waiving it for the chosen few. In practice, of course, there were regular customers you were on first names terms with who we saw every week and who didn't need to produce it every time. Customers were meant to have two forms of ID with them, including proof of address, when they sold items. When customers were selling records and CDs, for example, the issue of whether they had ID or not was key. Almost any transaction had elements in it that could quickly escalate into a row. In fact, behind the counter customers were always dismissively referred to as 'custies' - a play on the ' Crusty' movement of the time.Īt times it seemed like working in a second-hand record shop was like a war of attrition between the customers and the staff as to who had the upper hand at any given point. ![]()
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