Menards — Local services in Monona

Good afternoon,

My partner and I just had quite the experience at the Monona, WI store location. We simply needed to exchange a faulty shower head that we bought this morning. The woman with short grey hair at the return counter was incredibly rude the second we walked up, and could not even be bothered to ask "what can I help you with?". No sooner had we said "I need help exchanging a faulty part" than she snapped in a loud voice "well that's not how we do it here!" She accused us of trying to shoplift, while we were standing at the return counter, and immediately assumed we didn't have our receipt. Keep in mind, we had just walked up, and had not even had a chance to present the receipt yet, which was safely tucked inside the box with the defective part. She could have simply asked if we had the receipt. This is, after all, the bare minimum for a return process. She literally said the words "I could have that security guard arrest you for shoplifting." I'm not sure why she would have thought we were stealing when we walked in with a receipt and a defective product. If I'm not mistaken, it is against Menards' policy to accuse anyone of shoplifting. She also demanded we return the rest of the set, which is currently installed in our bathroom. We were shocked that she would imply we need to go back home and uninstall all other working pieces, the faucet, handle, and internal plumbeing parts, just to be able to get a working shower head. My partner worked at a Menards service desk for 5 years, and knows the return process. In fact, he just exchanged a defective part recently, in the same manner, at this same store location. I have never been treated so poorly, as a criminal, when I am simply coming to the service counter for assistance. That is what they're there for, correct? Assisting paying customers? I have also never been so mortified in public.

We were then shuffled off to the plumbing counter without so much as a "sorry for the miscommunication, this is just the process you need to go through", where a man proceeded to accuse us of poor installation and damaging the product. When we arrived at his desk, and said "this part is defective", he threw his hands up in a carless shrug and said "so?". I guess if you look young, the employees at this Menards have full permission to treat you like an irresponsible moron and a criminal. Truely unfortunate. My partner has replaced shower plumbing many times, and is not some idiot child to be talked down to. I have worked in customer service for 7 years, and would never dream of speaking to a customer like that.

After being stepped on, talked down to, and interrogated for a good 15 minutes, he finally grabbed a new box and proceeded with the exchange. The new part works, of course, as we knew it would, verifying that the part we returned did in deed have defective threading, as we so patiently explained over and over. Through this embarrassing and frustrating process, we did not roll our eyes, huff and puff, or call anyone out on their rudeness. We understand that is not how you treat human beings, no matter the situation.

I would highly recommend an empathy training class for these employees, as they certainly don't know how to treat human beings with even the minimum amount of respect...

DO NOT, under any circumstances, purchase custom countertops or anything else you can't return directly to a Menards store. Midwest Manufacturing, who makes products solely for Menards, and who 3 employees at this store told me IS Menards, has the mindset that their products can't fail, and if they do, it must have been your fault. Feel free to look up reviews on their company.

I designed solid surface countertops on the website with a recommended quartz sink. The sink clips provided can not handle the weight of a 50lb undermount sink, bent in half backwards, releasing the sink, causing the countertop to flex and snap at the poorly reinforced seam. It has taken up to 7 weeks per email to get a reposnse just to receive copy and paste responses that ignore everything I said. First, I was told I didn't use enough epoxy. Then, that I didn't use silicone. Both of these claims are objectively false based on the photos I provided. How could the sink clips literally bend in half backwards if I didn't use enough epoxy? If I didn't use enough epoxy, the clips would have detached from the countertop before they could have bent in half. This is common sense stuff.

Management in store refused to help and lied about emailing the countertop company for me. Corporate refused to help and kept pointing me to the countertop company. The countertop company, which IS Menards, wasted my time for 6 months copying and pasting the same responses after weeks of waiting to hear back. Once they have your money they don't care anymore and won't honor the warranty. I didn't even mention how the countertops weren't the exact size I ordered or how the edges were poorly finished and porous in spots.

My elderly father and I have been lifelong Menards customers. I have renovated my home almost exclusely with their products. Why should I continue supporting a company that doesn't care about the quality of their products? That doesn't care about their customers and their time? I don't need a response telling me how you want to help and you need my business. I've talked to you already, you were unwilling to help. I'll just assume you didn't actually read this review like you didn't actually read my warranty claim. I had no countertops or a sink in my kitchen for 6 months. I gave you all the time in the world to make up for your product failing. Ultimately, I explained the situation to my credit card company and, go figure, they easily won the case to get...

Had a very frustrating experience with online order for pickup today. Ordered 3 bags of cement for pickup because I am very pregnant at the moment and needed help. Walked alllllll the way to the back of the store and eventually found the order pick up area which was poorly marked and hard to find. They told me they don’t grab my particular order for pickup and that I had to go into the yard to get it myself. This made no sense to me as there were 3 other bags of concrete waiting for someone by the pick up area. I didn’t have time for that at the moment so I had to leave and come back later. This was already taking way more time than I had planned for. When I went back an hour or so later which was totally out of my way now, I drove to the yard, was told to go to the order pickup area inside instead. I refused since I had already tried that for this order. So I was directed to the pick up area at the back of the store. When I got there he then directed me to go 3 doors ahead to the building materials area, so I drive ahead and go back inside and find a counter person. I am then told I need to go back the way I came, through the fence to the middle aisle on the big covered area out back. He at least had a map and showed me where to find it. He said there would be someone to help me load. So, I go finally find where this product is kept and can’t find anyone around to help me. I holler for help, I walk around to look. Crickets. I am PISSED off at this point and need to go so I have to just load 150 pounds of bagged concrete myself. 7 months pregnant! The first bag I grab is ripped open and dumps all over my foot. To make this even worse, my order for it doesn’t seem to be eligible for the 11% rebate advertised because I don’t have a paper receipt. I’ve never had such a problem getting anything from the yard here. Ordering online for pick up was waaaaaaayyyyy more difficult than just going in for it. Menards you have lost me. I’m so angry I may...