VIDEO: Should Happiness Be Mandatory for Store Employees?

Updated
Jeff Somogyi
BY:
DealNews Contributing Writer
Additional contributions by Louis Ramirez and Dan Leadbetter.

Until just this week, cashiers at the pharmacy chain Walgreens were required to say "be well!" at the end of every transaction. And that's just one of many examples of corporate-mandated politeness.

In this brief video, our experts discuss if they'd rather have a person be fake-pleasant, or honestly grumpy.


What about you, readers? Do you like it when people are fake-nice to you, or do you not care how cashiers treat you? Tell us in the comments below!

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DealNews Contributing Writer

Jeff Somogyi is constantly trying to come up with ways to surprise and delight audiences the world over. He takes humor seriously ... too seriously. (Honestly, we've never seen him laugh ... it's kinda creepy.)
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4 comments
dorothyparnell
They are not children or robots, they should be smart enough to have good manners without being instructed or zoombiefied..djp
April 1, 2015
kramyugtaht
Put it this way, I go to the store to buy something - and that thing is not a pleasant psychological state from someone being nice. It's like upscale grocers that pay more attention to their image than selling food, where the products are neither better quality not better prices - no thanks.
April 1, 2015
HeyTiger
On the one hand, you can't force people to be happy, but on the other hand, I don't want to deal with anyone's BS. Professionalism is non-negotiable, but happiness, fake or otherwise, is optional.
April 1, 2015
kramyugtaht
I remember this one time I had a grumpy clerk wait on me at a middle eastern deli, and it looked like his boss pulled him aside and talked to him about it. Sometime after that I noticed him with this obviously forced smile, it looked painful. That was kind of funny (maybe not for him) but what I really don't care for is people who have that glued on smile that you KNOW they don't mean. To take it to an extreme I would say people who can't distinguish good service from just service with a smile maybe don't deserve good service. At the end of the day we want the person helping us to know what they're doing and get things done.
April 1, 2015