while it is hilarious when the customer looks at his box of crayolas and asks with grave concern, "do i need batteries with this?" i am still irritated that i have to deal with this level of stupidity at all.

see, if we don't ask, they get the damn batteries for free.

the thing is this: the company makes the most money off batteries, because batteries have the highest mark-up. okay, fine. so then why the fuck do we have to ask? batteries sell themselves, i should think. if that's what we're making the most money off of, obviously we're not having any trouble selling them whether we ask or not.

don't you think it would make more sense to ask the customer if they'd like to purchase something that doesn't ordinarily move like lightning off the shelves?

"excuse me, would you like to pick up a book with that?"