Shelley Bridgeman: A battle getting your money's worth from the urge to shop

There is nothing like a spot of retail therapy for lifting the spirits.

Dedicated shoppers just know that life will be quite perfect if they can only acquire some long-coveted item or snare some particularly cheap bargain.

But it's like an addiction, some endless search for fulfilment - and somehow there is always one more item we need to cure all our ills.

Speaking of which, there are a few ills in the retail trade that could do with some curing. Despite the marketing gurus and retail specialists who supposedly know what consumers want, shoppers continue to have less than desirable experiences.

Perhaps the shops could do with some retail therapy of their own so they can identify the foibles customers must endure.

One of the main problems is not being able to identify shop staff when we need assistance.

It's okay if they have a uniform or name badge, or stand conveniently behind a counter or carefully fold neat piles of cardigans. But in the trendier parts of town the modus operandi of many staff seems to be milling about the store, perfectly camouflaged among the shoppers.

While it's understandable that store detectives should blend in with the clientele, it makes no commercial sense for the shop assistants to be incognito as well. I have left stores simply because I've been unable to work out who worked there.

On one occasion, I persevered in a High St store and pounced on each person present to ask if they worked here. They all looked at me as if I were mad. I got the blankest stare of all from one young, spiky-haired guy wearing horn-rimmed glasses who turned out to be the elusive assistant.

Clearly, though, such sensitive information was revealed only on a need-to-know basis.

Supposing we manage to find a shop assistant, the next step in a clothing store is to try on the item. Which brings us to one of the slyest tricks around, skinny mirrors. These are unforgivable for they are not a result of some systems failure or of someone having an off day. They are installed deliberately.

If shoppers are not suspicious by nature, it's possible they will never even realise there is something strange about the mirror. A so-called skinny mirror is a full-length mirror which is fixed to a wall by a wedge-shaped backing which has the effect of tilting the mirror along the horizontal axis.

It is a devious ploy to make customers look thinner and consequently snap up whatever they happen to be trying on. But when you get them home the miraculous thin trousers suddenly are not quite so slender. It's a trap for young players but it's easy enough to verify simply by peering around the side of the mirror.

I have been known to get a measuring tape out to confirm my suspicions. And I never buy from a shop that is prepared to dupe its customers in that manner.

Less insidious but annoying nonetheless are the shops that have earnest messages on the back of the changing-room doors promising that their staff won't disturb you while you are trying on clothes.

It's a nice idea but often these promises are not honoured. And have you noticed that shop assistants only ever seem to barge in when you have one leg in and one leg out of a pair of trousers and you are flashing underwear well past its best?

Frustrating, too, are the upscale clothes shops too stingy to put mirrors in each fitting room, forcing customers to do their preening and twirling in front of a communal mirror in view of other shoppers.

We don't mind doing this in bargain-basement stores but we expect better from the smarter establishments.

And don't you just hate it when shop staff reply with something along the lines of, "Oh, we don't stock such-and-such any more. They used to fly out the door but now there's absolutely no demand for them" when you ask for a particular item?

There is nothing as effective for making you feel like an out-of-tune-with-the-world, behind-the times reject from the 1970s. They might as well have done the "L" sign across their foreheads and said: "Loser, you are so last century. Get a life".

All this nit-picking and complaining is enough to make anyone quite blue. Clearly a dose of shopping is called for. I spied a wonderful glittery, pink, beaded handbag in a shop window that is sure to make everything better. Must dash.

* Shelley Bridgeman is an Auckland writer.