Not Painting A Picture That Ends In A Purchase

(I work at a very small hobby shop with my husband. We may be small, but we have wholesale accounts with many big-name companies that supply games, mini figures, and other supplies to do with tabletop gaming so we can order anything a customer needs for no extra cost, and we inform customers of this all the time. This happens on one of our late game nights where people can come in and just play.)

New Customer: *chatting with a regular about paints or mini figures for D&D* “Oh, so you use these kinds of paints?”

Regular: “Oh, yeah, these are great for figures, and so are the Warhammer paint sets.”

New Customer: “Where can I get these?”

Regular: “You’d have to ask her.“ *points to me* “She is the order master here.”

(I smile and look up.)

New Customer: “Where do you get these paints?” *holds up one of our colors for sale*

Me: “We order them. We can get many different colors.”

New Customer: “Yeah, but where do you guys get them? What store can I buy them from?

Me: *with a tight smile* “We’re a store. We sell them.”

New Customer: “Yeah, but do you guys order these from a craft store around here or online someplace?”

Me: *trying to keep smiling* “Yes, we have a wholesale account that we place orders through. We get figurines and those paints from them.”

New Customer: “Oh, okay.” *puts the paint back and goes to join his friends*

(We are a store? You can buy these from us? Whatever! Our regular buys tons of our paints!)