So, it's the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, and I decided to go buy some new pans, serving dishes, a trifle bowl, new turkey fork, and a stove top espresso maker (I've been meaning to buy this for several months, but thought it would be a great time to actually do it) and I decided to take the wife and daughter with me to the new kitchen and cooking store in Muncie where I attend Ball State (though I'm now only 5 months away from heading to law school!).
If you know me and the family, I am crazy about 2 things and these are where all my extra cash go: cookings supplies and nice clothes. As the Chef's corner in West Lafayette knows, before I moved from there to attend BSU, I spent lots of money on spices and cookbooks, as well as new kitchenware before the holidays as I hate stagnant kitchen accessories.
So we go the the store, and the wife is carrying Lily, I walk to the spices and look around to find something for the ham, and after finding what I want, I wondered to the dishes and found this cool square plate set I want. Finally I wonder to the back and find the stove top espresso makers and am trying to decide to buy the 42 dollar one, or the 48 dollar one (same maker but included Lilly expresso coffee which if you are familiar with them, are an Italian coffee and you find them in bon appetite which I have subscribed to now for about 5 years). I decide to get the one with espresso since I am about out of beans anyway, and go find the wife. When I go to here she says we are leaving now and we are not buying anything.interesting since my wife doesn't mind if I buy kitchen stuff anymore.
We walk out, and I'm thinking the baby or my wife had to go the the restroom immediately. Well, it turns out, the owner was sitting there the entire time after we walked in, and was talking to her employee about how my wife and I look like we can't afford anything in her store, and she has had it with students and local persons coming in browsing and bringing their kids in and she wishes she could call the police and kick us out and send us to jail. She also said that she couldn't believe my wife let Lily touch a tricycle that was in the middle of the floor, which is the same trike in this months bon appetite. Apparently, my wife said the lady made it a point to talk loud enough that she could not believe I did not hear, though I tend to ignore people when I'm shopping as I don't care what they're doing.
My point is, we were the only people in here store for the approximately 10 minutes we were there. I know of no one who has shopped there, most students don't even leave campus for this very reason: the local shop owners are often rude and mean to students, even those of us who are not 18. Muncie is a very middle class area, with Very few people making over 50 thousand dollars a year. Aside from some attorneys and higher level academia at BSU, the middle class is the backbone of this area.
I do my best to support local shops, we buy all our vegetables and breads from the farmers market every Saturday, and every other Saturday, Cody and I go early and have breakfast at the blue bottle cart. We do our best because I know the prices are a little higher often, but I also understand why and I like supporting people who own their own business.
I will not be supporting this shop. If you don't intend for people to browse, than a shop is not the thing to do. Much less to open it in downtown where the bulk of shoppers supporting the area aren't driving Mercedes or BMW's. Every shop owner knows its not the giant once a month splurges that keep you open, its the people coming in buying 50 to 60 bucks of stuff each time they come in, an d telling their friends about the great finds, or in this case, a place that needs to close down and relocate to another area. I have never been so insulted nor seen my wife so upset as when this sixty year old lady, obviously bitter because she isn't making enough money, would stand there and say such disrespectful things to us.
What if we were seriously low income and that was our splurge for the month was to buy a new serving dish for our family's thanksgiving?
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