I’m pretty sure you’re all aware that I’m an avid shopper. I would even go so far to say that I could be classified as an expert. I like quality and I’m not afraid to pay full price for something I want, but I also love a good sale and bargain. In short, I have embraced shopping as a vocation.

With that established, I am about to climb firmly on my soapbox and have a mini-rant. So grab your popcorn and beverage of choice and settle in. This is a list of my shopping pet peeves – in no particular order, other than how they popped into my head. It is also not comprehensive; I have no doubt a few annoyances will pop into my head shortly after I hit Publish.

1. Boxes within boxes. While I would prefer to have my goods delivered to me in a folder that requires no unpacking, I understand that boxing is a requirement for some vendor systems and Marketplace. However, once I have that box ready to open, I am not going to be pleased if there is a duplicate box inside that requires yet more unpacking! This is especially frustrating if the box is nestled inside a folder, leading me to believe that I have already gotten to my treasures, only to be faced with another box that needs to be cracked.

2. Not knowing whether to rez or wear the box for unpacking. I am thrilled that so many creators have moved to a wearable box or bag that you can click to open (or it does it by itself when it is attached). After years of being conditioned to rez a box to open it, so as not to have an unwanted accessory in the form of a parcel on one’s head, I am slowly beginning to automatically ADD the box to my person to open it. However, in many cases, this is done as a guess since I have no instructions on what to do with said box. PLEASE, add the word WEAR in the item name if I’m supposed to put the sucker on my body to retrieve the contents. I would be happier if REZ was included in the title of those clunky packages that don’t have an unpacking script, but I will settle for knowing for sure which objects I should be wearing to open. And please be consistent in how you pack your items. If you are going to use a wearable packing box, do it all of the time. It’s embarrassing attaching a bulky container to oneself that requires rezzing when you have been conditioned to wear a package from a particular designer! Oh, and if it is something tiny and wearable, like a necklace, and it isn’t boxed, DEFINITELY put WEAR in the description. I’ve chased more than one little bauble around the floor, trying to pick it up since I didn’t know it wasn’t packaged (this happens fairly often with gacha prizes).

3. If your box has to be rezzed to open, be kind on Land Impact. While I have plenty of prims to play with, not everyone does. I do adore a creative delivery box; I have used several to decorate over the years. However, if you’re going to get fancy, please be considerate of Land Impact! There have been plenty of times in my SLife that I have had to go to a sandbox or remove items from my own parcel to rez a box. By all means, give us something pretty and clever to look at, but with the advent of mesh, there really is no reason to package your goods in a 43 prim parcel! (Yes, I have had a delivery box with that many prims.)

4. List permissions on your vendor add. This is especially important when you use a vendor system that uses the Pay function instead of Buy. There is literally no way to tell from an item in a vendor what the permissions are. I want to know if I’m getting a one-rez item or if I can copy to my heart’s content. And I really want to know if it is mod – I just gnashed my teeth today over a chair that was giant size once rezzed only to discover I could not shrink it down so that I didn’t feel like a two-year old swinging my feet a metre above the floor. Guess where that went? Yep, straight into my trash.

5. If you’re selling mesh clothing, have a demo available. I just won’t buy mesh clothing that I can’t try on. Even it is at a sales event. Even if you swear you are using standard sizing, I have learned by hard experience that not all standard sizing is created equally. This is especially true of the alpha layers. An otherwise gorgeous outfit can be wrecked if the alpha cuts outside the clothing layer or if it doesn’t cover enough to prevent elbows and shoulders from peeking out.

6. Mesh hair makers: PLEASE give us a note card that includes the head dimensions you use! You know, I don’t really mind adjusting my cleavage and breast buoyancy to make a top or a dress fit. Your bust size is usually determined by the size of mesh clothes you wear, anyway (I’m not talking Lola’s here). But when I have to start messing around with my head to get hair to fit, I draw the line. Changing the head size, forehead dimensions, head roundness, and so on can drastically change the look of my FACE. While I have changed my body shape fairly radically over the past three years, my face has stayed the same. I need to know the head size for rigged mesh hair so I can make a decision on whether it is worth the risk to changing my head shape to make it fit. And alphas aren’t always the answer; an alpha doesn’t cover the hairline on the forehead.

7. Display new releases in an easy-to-access location. I really hate seeing a new release advertised on a blog or Flickr, excitedly heading to the mainstore to buy it and having to traipse halfway around the sim to find what I am looking for. If you can’t place it at the landing point, please offer a TP board or at least directions to where the new stuff can be found. If I can’t find it within a few minutes, chances are I am going to get frustrated and leave.

8. If you are running a popular sales event, make the layout user friendly. Up until this point I haven’t named names of offenders. However, I had such a terrible experience at The Season’s Story earlier this month that I am going to use it as an example. Granted, I went on the first day and it was very busy, but that doesn’t change the difficult layout. First, when landing, customers were faced with a long trek up a snow-covered hill, down the other side, through a stream and up another hill just to get to the sales area. When I arrived, there were 23 people on the sim. Busy, but not at capacity. It still took me over five minutes just to run the gauntlet to get to the goodies. Once I was there, I stationed myself about halfway down the path and cam-shopped the entire length of the row. But there were items that I couldn’t find; and I wasn’t the only one. I heard several people in local chat asking where a certain item was and I hadn’t seen any of them. As it turns out, there was another sales area that you needed to access by a bridge. If there was a sign pointing this out, it never rezzed for me…or, apparently, for the other frustrated shoppers. Yes, it was a beautiful sim. But the point of being there wasn’t to take photographs; it was to buy the wares of the creators who I venture to guess had paid dearly to have a place in the event. I wonder how many sales were missed, simply because of the confusing and frustrating layout.

9. Getting hit by a group inviter every few feet. Hit me once when I land; I don’t mind. I’m not about to join your group simply because you invited me (my group real estate is very crowded). But if I get hit by an invitation every time I move to a different area of the store, I’m probably going to either mute the spammer or just leave. And I probably won’t be coming back.

10. Not having your name as creator on items. This may not be a big deal to most shoppers, but to a blogger it is extremely frustrating. More and more often I am running into (Unknown) as the designer listed in the Properties. I do my damnedest to credit every item I blog and it drives me crazy having to come up with creative ways to find the maker. Oh, and if you are using a template, please create a root prim with your name so the template creator isn’t the one who is credited.

11. Keep your mainstore SLurl updated in your profile. I don’t trust landmarks. I delete almost every one that comes with the item I have purchased. Why? Because Second Lifers have a transient existence and I have landed in the middle of someone’s bedroom more times than I care to count by using a stale landmark. When I blog, I go to the creator’s profile and check for the location of their store in their Picks. I’m not sure about other viewers, but with Firestorm it is as simple as standing at your landing point, bringing up your Picks, clicking Set Location then OK. A few seconds is all it takes to keep up to date with where your store is this month.

12. Central landing points without a TP board or directional markers. OK, as a sim owner, you want to give all of your tenants the benefit of foot traffic. I get that and I even respect it. However, if your sim contains dozens of stores with multiple streets and alleyways, I’m probably not going to stick around long enough to find what I came looking for – especially if directional beacons aren’t working. A TP board or set of directional signs (sorted alphabetically, thank you) with the store names might be a bit of a hassle to keep up with, but chances are tenants will stick around longer if customers know where they are located. And while I am perusing that board or signpost, I might just see another place or two I want to stop by for a bit of window shopping…or, more likely (knowing me) some actual purchasing.

I think I’ll stop at an even dozen. Feel free to jump on my soapbox and rant away in the comments!

Pretty stuff I’m wearing:

Outfit: {Indyra Originals} {Indyra} Chick Wish by Indyra Seigo
Shoes: tulip. Gladiator Sandals (Black) by Minami Susanowa (for Slink Flat Feet)
Necklace: Pendant Daisy White by Damen Gorilla (In SL Library)
Hair: /Wasabi Pills/ Lory Mesh Hair – Cinnamon by MissAllSunday Lemon
Skin: [PXL] Creations – [PXL] JADE SK Bare Lips MEB C2 by Hart Larsson
Hands: Slink Mesh Hands (av) Casual by Siddean Munro
Feet: Slink Mesh Feet (Av) Flat by Siddean Munro
Hand & Feet appliers:[PXL] Creations<a – [ PXL ] Slink Hand & Feet Appliers SK by Hart Larsson
Eyes: Amacci Gaze Eyes – Ocean Blue by Carina Larsen
Lashes: Mon Cheri *MC* “Falsies” Eyelash by Freya Oliveri

Pose & props: aDORKable Poses – Gacha Shopping Spree 9 by Adorkable Peapod (Gacha prize – NLA)