I love the above commercial where the guy thinks that the service station men are trying to mug him and take his car. We are so used to getting treated like crap as consumers that when we see something that is genuine and wholesome, we look for the illusion. What’s the catch? How much money do we actually have to invest? Consumers are vulnerable and are taken advantage of by greedy corporations several times a day. From the coffee at the drive-thru in the morning, to the gas we need to get to work, to the pharmacy to get our medications, to the grocery store to buy ingredients for dinner…we are constantly getting ripped off. We pay top dollar for crap…crap that we have to replace with more crap in a year. Sometimes less than a year, especially if said crap was bought at Wal Mart.
This latest tirade was initiated by my once weekly trip to Starbucks. I know, I’m a total sucker, but I absolutely refuse to go to Dunkin Donuts (refer to blog “Bring Back Bess Eaton”). Starbucks new thing is making the orders one at a time. This idea is supposed to bring the customer the freshest coffee drink possible. Well……..that may be true, but make sure that you have an extra twenty minutes to devote to buying a drive-thru coffee. So I enter the dreaded 15 minute Starbuck’s line. I order something unusual, a hazelnut cappuccino, which is not my normal drink. I wait the expected time, and receive my drink…which ends up being only about 8 ounces of fluid in a 16 ounce cup. The rest of the cup is made up of foam. I know that cappuccinos have foam, but it shouldn’t make up more than half of the drink. Plus, they think I’m going to pay $4.50 for a cup of air????? I don’t think so. So launches my tirade. I take out my frustrations on the open-mouthed guy giving out the drinks for the day. I tell him that there is no way I’m paying that much money for a cup of air, and tell him to take it back. He offers to give me the drink for free, which I oblige to. If anyone knows me, I actually never do anything like this. I’m one of those passive consumers that will take out their frustrations with their spouse, even though it’s not their fault. But lately, call it age, or just call it general bitchiness, but I’m tired of getting ripped off. Therefore, I am slowly beginning to open the big mouth that I was blessed with, and scare many unsuspecting store employees in the process.
Cell phone companies are another huge joke. They are pulling in consumers like lambs to the slaughter. Some companies (cough…Verizon) are charging people for the cell plan, and then charging another amount for a data plan. And if you have a certain type of phone, you are forced to buy the data plan? And then some plans are charging extra if you want your phone to download faster? Holy crap…I thought I finally found a good solution to the cell phone plan problem. I pay $25.00 per month for a prepaid Virgin Mobile plan, which gives you unlimited text and web and 300 minutes of talk per month. This is a perfect plan for me because I don’t talk on the phone that much, but text a lot. It’s great except that if there is a mistake when opening your account online, you end up getting charged for services you don’t have, and it’s near impossible to get your money back. As of today, they owe us over $125.00 for some phantom account that keeps withdrawing from my PayPal. They can’t find the problem, and really don’t seem to care all that much. I just keep calling and yelling, but to no avail. Which reminds me, I’m due for my weekly call to them too…
Don’t even get me started on Wal-Mart. If you want something to work more than a couple of weeks, don’t buy it there. Wal-Mart is a manufacturer’s graveyard. Things that don’t pass quality control go to Wal-Mart stores. So that deodorant that doesn’t roll up, or the cleaner that doesn’t spray, or the hand soap that doesn’t pump, that’s all crap that the manufacturer says is not good enough to sell to regular stores. Wal-Mart eats it up, buys it for pennies and sells it for thirty cents cheaper than a supermarket. The consumer thinks they are getting a good deal. But you actually waste more money in gas to bring the crap back to Wal-Mart than what you get back when you return it. However, I bitch, but I still buy stuff from Wal-Mart. Someday I’ll get it. If I can find a decent cup of coffee…
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