Communication issue

[Lena_C]

Well, I'm not sure is this a kind of hit on or just chat up, today, before my German lesson, I go to Starbucks to buy a drink. Something strange just happen. When I want to order my coffee, the cashier/barista start a conversation with me like this,

Me: Caramel Macchiato, grande, please.
Barista: Do you want to try our new type of coffee beans? It's free to upgrade.
Me: Is there any difference?
Barista (seems frustrated but giggle): Yea, of course they're different. They definitely have different taste.
Me: No, I mean the taste. What's the difference?
Barista: Ahh, the original one was deep-roasted so it taste more bitter, but the new one...blahblahblah(I think it's not important so I won't write it out )
Me: Okay then I'd like to try.
Then he asked my name to write it on my cup, I gave him my surname.
Barista: Hey, you look familiar to me, do you always come here?
Me: ...Actually this is my first time to come in (this store).
Barista: Oh really?
Me: My school is somewhere around here. So, maybe I'll come here again I'm not sure.
Barista: There's school nearby? I didn't heard of it before.
Me: Near the Art Center.

I have no idea what's going on here.
When I said "Is there any difference?", I supposed he knew that he needed to explain more.
Is it too hard to understand? OR Am I confusing him? Is it my fault?
Also, this shop is locate at Gloucester Road in Wan Chai, where many core government offices concentrated over there, I supposed this kind of things (including chat up) could not and will never happen.
Why can't just let me get my drink and go?
The cafe is not empty so I think they have no reason to feel bored.

When I tell this story to my NT friends, they think the barista is nice and most of them seems enjoy to get hit on by guys. I find this totally nonsense.
Talk with me is okay and I appreciate it, but can you find some deep topic to start?

 

[Suzanne]

It sounds like a FRIENDLY banter not a chat up line, to be honest with you!

 

[tree]

Lena_C
"Talk with me is okay and I appreciate it, but can you find some deep topic to start?"

The guy was at work.
It was appropriate that his conversation with you be
on work related material. Asking your name is within
the bounds of work related activity. Suggesting that you may
have been in before/has seen you is also within the
bounds of his work---establish rapport with customer/
try to make the customer feel welcome & comfortable.

He has no way to know that this may creep you out.
He also doesn't know what level of knowledge you have about
various type of coffee beans. He doesn't know that any more
than you know what motive he has for engaging you in a
light conversational exchange.

Talking to you about a "deep topic" at first sight, while at
work, would be inappropriate behavior for him.

 

[garnetflower13]

The weirdest thing I have had happen, was that I was with a casual acquaintance and we stopped at a diner for coffee. The waiter came over to take our orders, and actually sat down next to me in the booth. I promptly scooted over and glared at him. I couldn't understand why he did that?

 

[Progster]

I think it was just friendly chit chat, I don't think that there was anything else going on there.

It really irritates me though, when you ask for a specific thing and they try to sell you something else.

I had a strange exchange at the supermarket, when I got to the checkout and the checkout girl asked me if I was satisfied with the service. What service??? All I did was literally just walk into the store, take three items and go the checkout. No interaction, no service involved.

 

[Lena_C]

I think some people here have already missed the point/misunderstood me.
I know that given my name is the part of their service so I'm not digging about it.
The problem I have is if he want to ask me to try a new thing, then he should introduce the product!
A barista should never suppose the customer have enough knowledge about their new coffee bean when he/she asked if there's any difference.
I didn't mean that I'm clever or what, I just think his reaction doesn't make sense to me.
Also, I didn't think friendly banter is a proper "service" for a barista who worked in an area which required high quality service.
In this case, I only didn't feel comfortable since he said I look familiar to him and then start a further chat on it.
Actually I'd never think it is a kind of service.
Nothing funny at all.

Hit on/chit chat doesn't matter anymore. (sorry I really don't have a sense of it, but thanks for everyone who tell me what it is )
Maybe it's difficult for you to understand what really happened yesterday due to the lack of facial expression in words,etc.
But I feel better now because some of you apparently can related to my feeling.

 

[HappyHermit]

I think it was just friendly chit chat, I don't think that there was anything else going on there.

It really irritates me though, when you ask for a specific thing and they try to sell you something else.

I had a strange exchange at the supermarket, when I got to the checkout and the checkout girl asked me if I was satisfied with the service. What service??? All I did was literally just walk into the store, take three items and go the checkout. No interaction, no service involved.

It could be that they're trying to find out whether you were able to find everything you wanted, and that the service consisted in keeping the shelves stocked and the items organised in such a manner that customers can locate them easily.

It's not terribly obvious looking at it from the customer's end, and asking about the service may not be the best way to go about it, but that's how I would interpret it. At one of my regular supermarkets you're always asked whether you found everything you came in for. That's probably why this occurred to me.

Re the OP, the exchange seems ordinary enough to me, and I don't get the impression that the barista was trying to chat you up. Like you, though, the point where I might have wondered about what the point of the exchange was is when you asked about the difference between the types of beans and the barista replied that there is a difference (clearly! because otherwise he wouldn't have asked you whether you wanted to try the new brand) - without directly specifying what that difference is, even though you had asked just that. But, you know, depending on the noise level in the place, the barista's attentiveness at just that moment and whatever else might have been going on, that doesn't have to mean anything either and doesn't make him bad at his job or unprofessional. Perhaps he didn't hear you right, perhaps he had served hundreds of customers before you who didn't want to hear about the ins and outs of it and just wanted it confirmed that, yes, this is something new and tasty.

Asking whether you want to try something they newly started offering when you ordered something else is just done as marketing, to make you aware this new thing is now on offer. I realise it can be annoying to the customer when they're thinking 'I ordered X. If I had wanted Y, I would have ordered Y!'. From a business point of view, it's actually a good idea because most customers won't be that bothered by the question and all now know that they can also get Y at this business. I usually just say 'No, thanks' if I don't want to get into the pros and cons of Y there and then and know that I'm perfectly happy with X. Or otherwise, I do what you did and ask.

A deep, meaningful conversation isn't really in the cards on the job when you're working in a customer service position, I'm afraid. The most you can usually do is the type of small-talkish back-and-forth most of us dislike to some degree of intensity or other. I really detest small talk in most settings, but I've done it too on occasion, in these types of customer service jobs, to make myself feel less like an automaton that repeats the same question in the same way hundreds, if not thousands, of times a day, and to make people feel noticed and not served as if by a machine, which the majority appreciate, even if we, as the customer, sometimes think 'I just want my coffee/XYZ and leave'.

 

[Progster]

It could be that they're trying to find out whether you were able to find everything you wanted, and that the service consisted in keeping the shelves stocked and the items organised in such a manner that customers can locate them easily.

It's not terribly obvious looking at it from the customer's end, and asking about the service may not be the best way to go about it, but that's how I would interpret it. At one of my regular supermarkets you're always asked whether you found everything you came in for. That's probably why this occurred to me.

Thank you. Yes, you are probably right. That didn't occur to me at the time, and it just confused me. They should have reworded the question more precisely.