What do you Expect from a Vintage Shopping Experience?

I have just come back from a lovely long weekend away in Bournemouth (more of that in another post!) and whilst there I took the time to visit some of the Vintage stores in the Boscombe/Pokesdown area.
One store in particular called 'Per Sempre' is the reason for this post and I'll be interested to hear your thoughts on Vintage Shopping generally.

So Per Sempre.....
The shop looked lovely and inviting from the outside, and in it's favour it had a buzzy atmosphere as well as great displays. Which in a way is what made it SO frustrating, it just didn't deliver on it's potential! It could have been an amazing shopping experience but sadly it wasn't.

Firstly the owners had made the mistake of filling a small floor space with far, far too much stock. I can understand the idea that if you display everything you may have in stock you might sell more. However the clothes rails were packed so tightly with garments you couldn't actually browse through them. It was impossible to look at things properly and potentially damaging to the clothes themselves. I battled with one rail and then just gave up. 
The only person having any success was a girl who had cleverly brought her mother with her. The mother assessed the situation, then lifted and held an armful of garments from the rail which meant her daughter could then look through the what was left with relative ease, mother's do know best it seems!

Secondly the random jumble of clothing was insane. Now personally I would like items to be grouped by era but that's just me I know! However I do think a little organisation doesn't go amiss.
It's just so much easier to have the full length maxis, and evening dresses together on a rail. Day dresses with other day dresses, formal with formal, summer and winter in seperate sections, blouses seperated from dresses and skirts no?

Thirdly the clothes had no sizes on them. Now we all know dress sizes have changed over the years, a size 10 then is not the same as a size 10 now, also not all vintage garments, especially handmade ones, have sizing labels. However it doesn't take much effort to whip a tape measure over a garment and have 'bust approx', 'waist approx', length etc measurements on the price tag. Whilst I was in the store I heard the question 'What size is this?' at least a dozen times (mostly from girl with her mother). The reply to one such question was 'I think it might be a 12, yes I remember looking at that dress when it came in and thinking it might be a 12, or maybe a 10' was hardly an enlightening answer! Again the assistant could have stepped out from behind the cash desk and done a quick measure of the dress.

Finally on to the handbags, it was almost there but sadly not.
They were cleverly displayed in, and on old suitcases.I stepped forward for a happy rummage, but it was not to be. The prices were a little high it's true, but if the item was right that wouldn't have mattered. What I was most disappointed about was the lack of attention to detail. If I'm going to pay over £30 for a vintage bag I don't expect it to be full of grit and fluff and general detritus from it's previous owner, nor should it be thick with dust and dirt on the outside. Maybe from a charity/thirft shop, but not from a vintage store. It wouldn't have taken much effort to spruce up the bag to make it worth it's £30 tag, at the very least brush it out and give it a quick wipe over!


So am I alone in my above gripes? What do you expect from a shopping experience? Would the above have put you off? What surprised me was that this was a shop in a row of other vintage and antique shops. With competition on the doorstep would you not have made a little more effort?