DUMBEST SALESCLERK OF THE YEAR, IF NOT THE CENTUREY

Swiss salesclerk would not show world’s richest woman a purse because she thought a black person could not afford it

When Oprah Winfrey was in Zurich, Switzerland to attend Tina Turner’s wedding last month, she spotted a crocodile purse in the swank Trois Pommes boutique. A salesclerk would not show her the $38,000 Tom Ford bag, telling Oprah: “No, no, no, you don’t want to see that one. You want to see this one because that one will cost too much. You will not be able to afford that one.”

Since she did not refuse to serve Oprah, I do not believe the clerk is a racist. But she does appear to have stereotyped a black person as unable to afford an expensive sales item. Thus the clerk gave us a good example of racial profiling.

In any event, this was a monumental screw-up. Either the Trois Pommes clerk does not own a television set and has never seen a magazine with Oprah’s picture, or she is the dumbest salesclerk of the year, if not the century. Oprah could have bought the Trois Pommes boutique without blinking an eye.