Service, shopping and the Dutch

September 24, 2004

While I am having a grumble about the cloggies, Noelene from Mums and Tots told me a funny story about her Dutch neighbours. They recently spent four days in New York with them and while they were there the neighbours constantly complained about the lack of customer service and courtesy shown by the Americans. We had to laugh, as this statement completely sums up any shopping experience in Holland.

I needed to buy a new hair dryer so went down to Media Mart to get one a couple of days ago. Thought it would be a relatively straightforward procedure but no. There were about 15 or so different models to choose from, I made my selection but the box was empty, along with three other boxes. I found a staff member who informed me that she was washing machines only and to find another person ‘over there’. I found another person ‘over there’ (had to wait while she finished her conversation with colleague, another dutch thing) and said that I would like to buy this particular dryer but the box is empty, stupidly assuming that the contents were out the back or somewhere else. The brightspark informed me that the box was empty, I said yes so was it somewhere else. We went to the display and found that the other two boxes were also empty, she informed me that they were also empty and that they were no longer stocking this item. I asked about the display item, no I couldn’t have that one because it was a display and suggested that they remove the empty boxes and the display if they couldn’t sell it. Her response was to put my empty box back on the shelf and arrange the others neatly also so there wouldn’t be a gap, end of conversation. I selected another.

The other very odd thing about shopping here in any form is the very odd opening hours. I now realise that we are quite lucky in New Zealand with the liberal trading laws. The retailers woke up to the fact that keeping the public happy and opening up on weekends is good for business, as the weekends are generally the best time for most people to have a good meander around.

Late night shopping is Friday night, which covers the centrum, shopping malls, supermarkets and most suburbs until around 8 or 9 pm. All good. The logic of opening hours of the other days is a bit of a mystery. The usual opening times are 9-5pm Monday to Friday and 10-4/5pm Saturdays. Sundays the shops open from lunchtime till around 4/5pm but only in centrum, in all other places, only on the first Sunday of the month, including the big places like IKEA. The suburbs are all closed completely and you don’t see a soul as they have all gone into the centrum or have gone cycling around Kralingse Bos.

Apparently, there is no demand for shopping on a Sunday and to support this, everyone in Rotterdam floods into the centrum, you can barely move for all the people milling around. The storeowners are probably out shopping anyway.

Then, because the retailers are so exhausted from all this frantic selling actively with their very generous opening hours over the weekend, they are closed on a Monday until lunchtime, even the outer suburbs that haven’t opened. This includes supermarkets and cafes, the post office, banks – everywhere and all over Rotterdam.

The other weird thing is the supermarket opening times they all close at 6pm during the week, 8pm on a Friday and 4 or 5pm on a Saturday. Forget Sundays, not sure if the first Sunday in the month rule applies. There are very few corner stores or dairies (none in centrum) so if you have forgotten to get something on your way home from work, you just can’t pop down to local the dairy – there aren’t any.

Rotterdam is filled with high-density housing and apartment complexes, especially in the city area so it is strange that there is nothing like the StarMart anywhere.