Kelly Rose Bradford: Common sense is not common after all

May 27 2009 Surrey Herald

AAh, common sense. It is a dying art, particularly, I've discovered, among retailers. Or, more specifically, the shop assistants I've encountered this week.

Firstly, I bought a mirror. You know, one of those glass things that bestows many years' bad luck if broken.

With that in mind, not to mention severed digits and other lacerations caused by smashed glass, common sense surely dictates that they are wrapped on purchase.

But no. Because obviously in these carrier bag and packaging free days, that is not allowed.

While I am all for re-using my carrier bags and generally have a stash on me when shopping, I do not routinely carry bubble wrap or cardboard boxes, as I explained to

the charming young man attending to my purchase who, by way of reply, shrugged and grunted and looked disinterestedly in the other direction.

The store I was in also sold crockery, masses of it, mix and match style, not boxed.

I posed a question: if I were to buy a dinner service, would I have to remove it, piece by piece from the store without so much as a piece of tissue to wrap it in?

He got my point and a piece of bubble wrap was miraculously produced and my mirror wrapped.

A few days later I was in a department store and bought a skirt. An amazing skirt to end all skirts. The skirt of my dreams, in fact.

I took it to the cash desk where its security tag was removed with such force by the assistant that a hole was left in the fabric.

Did she say "oops, I appear to

have made a gaping tear in this skirt you want to buy"?

No, she folded it up in a haphazard fashion and mumbled: "Do you need a bag?"

My reply was that I would prefer a skirt without a hole in it.

Reluctantly, she went off in search of another one, came back, took the tag off more gently and the transaction was completed. Almost.

She asked me again if I wanted a bag. Now, as this was an impulse purchase and I shouldn't have even been in a shopping centre, I only had my handbag with me.

The thought of stuffing my lovely new skirt into a bag whose depths are murky with half sucked sweets, hair, fluff and all the other detritus that lurks in the bottom was beyond contemplation, so I confirmed that yes, I did want a bag. Please. If it wasn't too much trouble.

As I suspect most other people who have spent vast amounts of money on new clothes would too.

Rather than, say, walking out of the shop wearing them, or carrying them under their arms like a bale of laundry.

It is all just common sense, really, isn't it?