Next Day Delivery....Maybe!

Despite the global economic downturn currently wiping out the largest of the largest banks across the planet (I have my own theories about this – mostly involving Mrs Gates washing a pair of Bill’s trousers which still contained his wallet and thus wiping out half of the worlds economy), this weekend I decided that I would ignore this and make an investment. It’s not an investment that will kick-start the global economy, nor in the whole grand scheme of things makes a significant difference, but in my own small way I have re-distributed an amount my very little wealth back into the system.

So what have I bought? Well, I’ve bought my first serious piece of furniture and I think it’s a rather exciting piece. It’s modern and yet well built, unlike most of the flat-pack cardboard furniture being sold by the majority of furniture shops these days. However, unlike flat-pack furniture, these things take time to be delivered and simply cannot be retrieved from the back of a warehouse; the dust brushed off and handed to the customer to start the task of ignoring the instructions and using the art of “guessing” to assemble incorrect screws into the wrong places in the hope that the table (which was probably a cabinet when you bought it), holds together and remains....upright.

After walking into the store and selecting the item I wanted, there was the inevitable stock check, which strangely gave me the exact answer I knew it would – “Out of Stock” – what I didn’t expect was to then be told that it takes 15 weeks to order. 15 weeks! That’s a lifetime for most pets. How on Earth can anything take fifteen weeks to be delivered? And more importantly how can these stores justify advertising their wares on the shop floor for sale, only to tell the customer that the item they have selected and want, they cannot have until 15 weeks after ordering? In a world of on-demand everything, where next-day delivery is king, how have these stores left them selves open to over a three month delivery period?

Oh of course, they’ve gladly taken my deposit too. This will no doubt be used to keep the company afloat just long enough for week 14 to arrive and then declare bankruptcy. That is assuming that my bank hasn’t wiped out all of my money before this time of course.

Still, it gives me something to look forward to – in the meantime though, I’ll be digging out my screwdrivers to turn the flat-pack table back into the cabinet it originally set out to be – 15 weeks will pass in no time.