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| - The selection at La Syd's (formerly Fashion Fitness) is not bad. Their customer service, however, is. They stock a reasonable selection of leotards, mostly in black and a few other basic colors like burgundy and navy blue. Their tights selection and shoe selection is pretty limited- they have a few options for ballet slippers and jazz shoes, though hardly any choice for pointe shoes. But overall, as far as dance stores go, they stock a reasonable range of dance gear at moderate to high prices.
But as I alluded to before, the customer service was appalling. I walked in on a weekend afternoon, with a genuine need to replace some disintegrating dance shoes and a genuine interest in acquiring a new leotard or two. I was the only customer in the store and walked over to the rack of adult leotards and started looking. I was immediately treated with suspicion and aggression, as though the proprietor was convinced that I wasn't going to buy anything or was there to shoplift or something. As I was gently thumbing through the leotards, the woman yelled across the room, "What are you looking for?" She didn't come up to me, she didn't greet me, and she didn't ask if there was anything she could help me with. I said I was just browsing and she repeated again from across the room, "Well what are you looking for?" So I responded, "Slippers and leotards." Again, without coming up to me, she started firing questions at me as I was just trying to look at the merchandise, what was I looking for, was I taking a dance class (duh), what school was I dancing at. I could tell she didn't believe I was seriously shopping and was therefore quizzing me to see if I could name a dance school in Calgary. She kept asking me what leotard I needed, and I kept saying I was just browsing to see if there was anything I liked (Is that not an appropriate way to shop? Look around until something catches your interest?) Finally she left her post at the counter and stood silently about 3 feet behind me while I looked through the rack of garments. She must have stood wordlessly behind me for about 3 minutes until annoyed with this woman breathing against my skin I decided to go explore another part of the store.
I went over to look at the wall of shoes, which has a small wooden dance floor in front of it. The moment I stepped onto the floor (you can't look at the shoes without standing on the floor) she said to me that there were no street shoes permitted on the dance floor. I hopped off of it and removed my shoes. Then I stepped back onto the floor to get a look at the shoes, and this time she actually *shouted* from across the room "Ma'am, there ARE NO STREET SHOES ON THAT FLOOR!" I looked back at her and said, "I took my shoes off on the carpet." No apology, no response. Amazing. I suppose I don't even have to mention that she did not offer to get me shoes in my size when I was looking at them.
Needless to say, after having been treated like a potential shoplifter and criminal during my 10-minute visit to La Syd's, I went ahead and confirmed the proprietor's suspicion that I WASN'T there to buy anything and WAS actually there to cause trouble and waste her time. Instead of buying something (which I really would have had I not had this experience as I was indeed in need of new dance shoes), I left empty-handed, disgusted, and offended. In this day and age when the exact same brands and models of just about every product in that store can be purchased on the internet in a greater range of sizes and colors and at about half the price (this is no exaggeration - a $46 leotard that I was looking at there can be purchased for $24 from online dancewear retailers, same brand, same style, same color), the real benefit to shopping and brick and mortar dance stores is being able to try things on and get help from knowledgeable staff and store owners. If these folks want to stay in business, they'd better step it up and give people a reason to shop there and not treat potential customers like dirt.
I should mention, however, that the proprietor's teenage daughter [?] who was helping out at the store, arranging merchandise, etc., was very sweet and offered to get me a fitting room when I was looking at a leotard. The owner should really take a lesson from her.
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