No, I Don't Want An Angels Card.

I've often admitted to having a sometimes unhealthy retail problem.  The trailers for the shopaholic film are a little over-the-top, but there are moments in them that seem eerily familiar.  So I'll admit I followed the Holiday Sales Blog on wallstreetjournal.com, I get weekly emails on sale items from my favorite stores, and though I've tried to limit splurges to necessities and fabulous, classic pieces that will ultimately add to my wardrobe in the long term, every once in a while I go crazy, buy a bunch of stuff I don't need and then I look at my bank account (I'm living a cash only lifestyle right now) and I get kinda nervous.

The economic downturn has, however, yielded a bit of a buyer's market.  Home prices are plummeting, stores that NEVER had good sales are starting to discount items, etc.  So, even given my limited budget, I am beginning to consider navigating the sales to be my long-lost talent.  That said, I also think this should be a time where retailers start to pull it together consider streamlining efficiency and, as my mother says, if a customer has chosen to shop your brand/your store, make it easy for them and treat them nicely.

This is where the good people at Victoria's Secret fail...miserably.  Besides the fact that if you have a large set of tatas, their push up bras have your nipples hitting your chin while walking...and even if you don't need the pushing up, you get it from nearly every decent-looking bra they produce (not to mention the fact that they don't sell anything smaller or larger than average), when you walk in the store, about 4-6 different employees offer you a carrier for your items (or items you've yet to select) while offering you their Angel Card and all its perks.  Meanwhile, when you're in the dressing room and the item doesn't fit, not only are the employees not really around, but they aren't up to speed on the product selection and availability (and it is not a place where you want to shout you need a smaller/larger size...really).  Further, no one ever offers to order the item for you if your size is not available (and if you suggest it, they stare at you as if this is a new concept) and quite frankly, maybe one employee in the store actually has a clue about women's undergarments and the complications and frustrations and sizing challenges therein.

Then you get to the cash/wrap.  On most occasions, I'm again offered the Angels card but on a recent trip, I waited in a long line while one manager rudely lectured a clearly new hire on how to handle a return while another manager gathered the rest of the employees on the floor around for a huddle and assigned them tasks (two of the people were assigned to give out carriers/peddle the Angels card).  There were over 8 customers with me in the line waiting to check out and the manager is sending people out to the rest of the store with carriers while one gal is there to assist with checkout but she's being lectured by the manager on returns (and she isn't completing a return).  It's no wonder their stock sells for $8 per share since they overstaff the floor with flaky, taskless nitwits and somehow expect people to buy things. 

Victoria's Secret has a comfortable monopoly in their industry, but if you ever wander into a department store lingerie department (at all ranges, from JCPenney to Nordstrom to Saks),  the service (and the selection in some) is 100% better.  You get the credit card offer once, you get help with sizing, you are left alone if you want to be and there is always someone there that will be more than HAPPY to take your cash in exchange for the undies.  No problem.  Thank you for shopping, come again.

Looking outside lingerie and going to, for example, JCrew.  You can return catalog items to the store (which I've learned is not an option at VS), you can pick up a "red phone" and call other stores to find an item in your size or from the catalog, and the staff has some semblance of an idea about their product line.  I am biased toward JCrew (save for their absurd price points on lower quality items), so forgive me if I often cite them as an example for all to follow.  

Every time I walk into a Victoria's Secret I want to say, "FOR THE LOVE OF RETAIL PULL IT TOGETHER YOU MORONS!!!!!!!!!!!!"  A friend of mine once ranted to the gal peddling the Angels store credit card that offering those cards to the young women barely out of high school (if at all) in the PINK (read: Sexy Stuff For Teens) section of the store is outright criminal and captures everything wrong with this country and the message we're sending to kids (i.e. "Buy this thong with a credit card so you can look sexy while making really bad decisions that used to be saved for your 20s but are now apparently OK at 14.").  They might as well give the girls a condom with every slutted up-thong with a pink puppy on it.  

It makes me want to hurl.  (Note: They don't sell slips either.  That is, a traditional, classic undergarment that apparently aids in preventing skirt/stocking clings is not available at VS - but I wouldn't know that because I live in the desert and haven't purchased one in years - a friend discovered this.  However, you can get a thong with puppies on it for your 14 year old sister/daughter/niece/etc.)

That said, I had a nice experience at VS this weekend with some girlfriends, but this was mostly due to the awesomeness of shopping for underthings with friends who dare you to go a little bit whorier than you are used to and was in NO PART due to the unhelpful staff and inefficient lack of connection between store and catalog/Internet.  Seriously, sometimes I think Victoria's true secret is that the bitch somehow cornered the market while not really making the shopping experience a good one.  A competitor needs to pop up.  And you're darn right I don't want an Angels Card.  Paying any kind of interest or getting coupons for a product that costs me at least 20 unnecessary minutes of my life I won't get back is the last thing I need to do (besides purchasing thongs for girls who haven't had algebra yet).