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Give me a ing break!
The Associated Press
NEW YORK -- Oprah Winfrey didn't waste any time in the new season of her syndicated TV show to revisit her summer feud with luxury store Hermès.
Halfway through Monday's premiere of "The Oprah Winfrey Show," the talk-show host addressed the incident in June when she was turned away from Hermès' Paris boutique. Winfrey was denied entry after arriving at the posh store 15 minutes after closing time — even though others continued shopping inside.
"I just want to say shame on anybody for thinking that I was upset for not being able to get into a clothes store and buy a purse," said Winfrey. "Please, please."
"Everybody who's ever been snubbed because you were not chic enough or the right class or the right color or whatever — I don't know what it was — you know that that is very humiliating and that is exactly what happened to me."
"I would like to say we're really sorry," said Robert Chavez, the chief executive officer of Hermès USA, who was a guest on Winfrey's show. "You did meet up with one very, very rigid staff person."
"Rigid or rude?" Winfrey challenged.
"Rigid and rude, I'm sure," Chavez replied.
Winfrey said she wasn't playing "the celebrity card" and that she knew "the difference between the store being closed and the store being closed to me."Nevertheless, Winfrey complimented Hermès on its handling of the incident (including "sensitivity training" for employees), and urged viewers to again buy Hermès products.
http://tv.msn.com/tv/article.aspx?news=202212>1=6955
I am a huge fan of Oprah. But lately, I've been liking her a little less. She is definitly in the wrong here. Anyone who's worked in retail knows, once you close the store, all the registers and deposits for the day are registered in and clsoed along with it. She is so pulling the "Celebrity" card here. If she was a regular Joe, she'd understand that this is how it works in the real world for everyone.
She's just causing trouble by pulling the whole "Race card."
What do you think?
Give me a ing break!
That's what I said! Oprah has really turned into those high and mighty celebreties this past year or so. She's always throwing those extravagent, exclusive, select celebrity parties only, she's always having either her celebrity friends on the show or a show about transgender people. I think she's lost some of her substance.
I don't know what the employee said or anything other than what I just read.
But to me, unless you have made special arrangements ahead of time, when a store is closed, it is closed. Sorry, please come again.
Granted their is a right and wrong way for an employee to deliver that message.
If anyone should be mad, it should be the store owner.
I could see an owner wanting to cater to potential big purchasers.
The employee didn't tell her anything other than, sorry we're closed!
I mean, , just the other day I walked into the Anne Taylor at the mall just as they were shutting the doors..............and they wouldn't let me in?
I can't believe that the President of Herme's actually went on her show and apologized to her. Not to metnion make employees take sensitivity training classes.
Doesn't this store stay open for celebrities so they could shop after hours without interference?
Yes, but they usually have to call in and arrange that before hand!
The owner had to go on the show and apologize to save face and business. People listen to Oprah. Therefore can make or break you.
It was a typical management reaction.
supposedly the store wasn't closed and people were still in there shopping... the french are very racist and she wasn't let in because she was black...
europe in general is a very racist place.
a lot of times the doorman would tell me the club was full bc they would think i was turkish... i would say(in english), are you sure the club is full.. and they would say, oh american, come on in..
Yes, and she knows that, hence refuting her "I'm not pulling the celebrity card" statement.
APU: plz come back again
big freakn deal
http://www.theonion.com/content/node/40759/2
Oprah Stuns Audience With Free Man Giveaway
September 21, 2005 | Issue 41•38
CHICAGO—The season premiere of The Oprah Winfrey Show unleashed a surprise for viewers Monday, when host Winfrey presented her studio audience with an unexpected gift: eligible men.
Enlarge ImageOprah Stuns Audience With Free Man Giveaway
Winfrey presents the studio audience with men.
"Everybody gets a man! Everybody gets a man!" said Winfrey, almost drowned out by cries of disbelief as 276 men, one for every member of the studio audience, filed onto the Oprah set.
Hoping to top last year's season-debut surprise, when members of the studio audience received free cars, Winfrey watched elated as the men knelt before their awestruck new mates and delivered gallant kisses and professions of undying affection.
"Signed, sealed, delivered... they're yours!" Winfrey said.
Hand-picked by Winfrey and her staff, the men range in age from 29 to 63 and were described by assistant producer Sally Heffernan-Ross as "great catches" with semi-professional to professional careers and stable personalities.
"Oprah showed it can happen: You can get that man of your dreams, or at least of your minimal expectations," Heffernan-Ross said.
The men, dressed in fresh chinos and polo shirts and bearing single red roses and gift baskets from Bath & Body Works, emerged moments after audience members were instructed to reach beneath their chairs, where they found inlaid boxes containing keys.
The keys, Winfrey explained, unlocked the doors to the men's individual domiciles.
"He's yours! He's completely yours!" Winfrey said to one speechless young woman who appeared stunned by what was going on around her. Assuring "no months of awkward dating" or "questions over who's going to make the first move," Winfrey said her man giveaway had totally eliminated the guesswork of romance.
The men Winfrey gave away are guaranteed to enjoy snuggling, to find the few extra pounds gained over time "cute," and to have read at least three books by the poet Maya Angelou.
"Oh, I love Maya," said one of the giveaway men, 32-year-old electrical engineer Doug Jefferson, who also enjoys warm, comfy sweaters. "I think she's very brave. Heck, I love poetry in general. Who doesn't?"
Winfrey had to reassure several of the more timid studio-audience members.
"Don't worry, ladies, they won't be going anywhere," Winfrey said. "Kiss him! Give his behind a little squeeze! It's okay—he's your man!"
As with 2004's Pontiac G6 giveaway, the man giveaway came as a complete surprise to audience members, many of whom said the men arrived just in time.
Enlarge ImageOprah Stuns Audience With Free Man Giveaway
Oprah celebrates with Stacy Feuerbach of Downers Grove, IL, who was given Daniel Berenbaum (left).
"I was beginning to think it was never, ever going to happen," said Karla Drozdowicz, 34, an unmarried bank teller from Superior, WI who won radio-sales executive Chris Iredell. "I'm totally thrilled to get Chris. He's not what I imagined from my romance stories, but I'll love him just the same."
Another audience member, Gwendolyn Havers, said her years of watching Oprah instead of dating had "finally paid off."
"My mom says my 'wallflower' personality keeps me from meeting men," Havers said. "Well, if I wasn't such an Oprah fan, I wouldn't have gotten tickets to her show, and I wouldn't have won [part-time assistant tech-support manager] Eric [Fitzgerald]."
Heffernan-Ross said the audience members were selected from a pool of "hundreds of thousands of single, lonely women" who had put in requests for show tickets.
"Unlike the selection process for the men, finding unattached women was very easy," Heffernan-Ross said. "All we had to do was stick our hands in a big barrel of letters, and voilá, our perfect audience."
Harpo Productions, Winfrey's production company, assured the winners that their prizes are guaranteed to "be into [them]" through 2010, and agreed to pay all local and state taxes relating to the men, as well. However, federal income tax and expenses such as meals, movie tickets, motel stays, teddy bears, plush slippers, and commitment rings will not be covered.
Audience member Karen Schoenegge, 38, who was awarded 41-year-old collections-department supervisor John Zimmerman, said several drawbacks have emerged since the show's taping.
"Well, as soon as we got back to the hotel, I found out that John doesn't give backrubs," Schoenegge said. "He's also weird about me walking in the bathroom to pee while he's in the shower. I mean, it's not like I'm looking at him. He needs to loosen up a little. But I shouldn't look a gift horse in the mouth. I really, really needed a new man."
The seven audience members who declined their men, saying that they were too insecure about their weight to feel confident in a romantic relationship, were instead treated to all-expenses-paid weekends at the Omni Hotel in downtown Chicago.
She's making too much out of this. She was LATE. The store was CLOSED. I'm pretty sure the people still shopping got to the store BEFORE they closed. Most stores don't kick people out just because its closing time.
, the best part of my job is pulling that gate at closing time and turning people away. I just want to get the out of there and go home.
Please tell me this is a joke!
Its the Onion...Of course it's a joke.
Oprah is, and has always been full of .
You were shopping at Ann Taylor???
I think thats teh big story here...whats up with that??
If Oprah comes toward my store with a checkbook in her hand (well, her assistant's probably), I'm opening back up. The commision would be worth it.
Perhaps Oprah should be the one taking sensitivity classes. Maybe show a little more respect for retail sales people and their working hours. But since she is accustomed to being treated like the Queen of Sheba, I don't see that happening. She is being ridiculous. She's making the Herme's president grovel on her TV show over this and, of course, he has to do it because she's one of the most powerful women in the world. No one ever dares critisize or challenge Oprah on anything. She is beyond reproach. And I'm so sick of the way people in this country worship Oprah like she's a freakin' deity. She has got to be one of the most over-rated, full of people in the world.I can't believe that the President of Herme's actually went on her show and apologized to her. Not to metnion make employees take sensitivity training classes.
Have you guys ever listened to Casting Crowns? In their song, What if People Prayed, there is a line that says: "WHat if people prayed and stopped asking Oprah what to do...." It's my favorite line in the whole song!!
Would you if she was only buying a purse.
You might want to check the prices of Oprah-level handbags.Would you if she was only buying a purse.
Guess how much this hat sells for at Hermes.
My answer is yes.
I once entered a Hermes shop in London because I saw a handbag that I was sure my wife would have liked. After I was told the price I decided to get her something cheaper.
She loves her new car!
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