How Good A Shopper Am I? Conceptualizing Teenage Girls' Perceived Shopping Competence

Academy of Marketing Science Review, 2006 by Palan, Kay M

"We have this game that we play. It's called the Buckle Game, because the people at The Buckle are paid on commission, and so in that store they come up to you and just push and push and try to make you buy. So we like go in, and the game is to try to go in and walk to the back of the store and touch the back wall and go back out without a salesperson talking to you. And so we really don't like The Buckle, and we just don't go in there as much." (Mandy, 14)

Informants were far more comfortable dealing with salespeople when an adult shopper was with them than when they were alone or even with friends. They also felt they were treated differently by salespeople depending on who they were shopping with.

"One time in Penney's I was with a friend and my mom was with my little brother in another part of the store getting him shoes and my friend and I were looking at something on the jewelry counter and we didn't know what it was so we picked it up and were looking at it. A saleslady came right over to us and was mad. She said you don't need to open it or pick it up to see what it is. It is marked on the label. We put it down right away and left to go find my mom." (Molly, 13)

"When I am with my parents they (salespeople) jump to help us. When I am with my girlfriends, they (salespeople) just look around as if there was nobody in the store." (Claire, 14)

"If you have a parent with you they're going to walk up to you and say 'Hi, can I help you?', but then if it's just you and your friends they're just going to completely ignore you."(Lucy, 13)

"I was at the Valley West Mall with my friends and since the first moment we went in (named a store) they (salespeople) were watching us. There were other people in the store and we were kinda getting upset because everybody else was like adult, but we were the only ones they were watching and that was bothering us because I'm not gonna steal so what's the point of this." (Rebecca, 14)

This informant interpreted the close attention from salespeople negatively; she assumed they were watching for potential shoplifters. This was a common assumption, and as noted in some of the following excerpts, it is this perception that salespeople view teens as potential shoplifters that contributed to informants' unwillingness to approach salespeople and to use them as a source of information and advice.

"You know some of them just have that look in their eye or they're just watching you to see if you're going to steal something. I mean some of us actually do get good grades in school." (Lucy, 13)

"I just don't like shopping with somebody looking down my back because then they always think that since we're kids we're going to take stuff and stuff like that so I just don't like it when they're looking at us. I'll talk to them if they ask us if we need help or some other weird question that they ask, but other than that I really don't talk to them." (Leah, 14)

"If they are just following certain people around the store it could be the adults who are stealing and they wouldn't know it cause they would just be following the kids around and the kids could just be like looking around and shopping and usually we have the money in our hands so they can tell we are going to pay for it and not just take it." (Stephanie, 14)