B & H Lawsuit....

Vince Lupo

Vince Lupo

Whatever
Local time
6:02 PM
Joined
Oct 17, 2007
Messages
7,832
I was reading the New York Times yesterday, and apparently there's some kind of discrimination lawsuit against B&H. They supposedly have an 'unwritten' policy regarding having female salespeople - something to having to do with 'religious reasons'.

Anyone know anything more about it?
 
I think it's B&H closes on Jewish holidays because the owners are Jewish... could that have anything to do with the "religious reasons"... I may be miss-remembering though. Personally I don't care, they're providing me a service, photography supply is not a right :) they can close whenever they want.

And just because a company doesn't currently employ any females, I don't think that should be used as proof they WON'T hire any. From the cross section of photographers I know the guys tend towards gear headed-ness while the girls tend to focus on the aesthetics of photography... maybe it makes the women better photographers but worse salespeople. On the other hand when I worked at Circuit City the girls usually out sold the guys (on average) because they took a less aggressive tack with customers, came off less like used car salesmen and nerdy guys who buy electronics have a harder time saying no to a girl.

Maybe it's just another frivolous lawsuit... or maybe the hiring manager is a chauvinistic pig. Point is I could be talking out of my ass and none of what I said is actually the problem because there's not much you can say definitively from another web sound bite that presents very little fact besides those big dollar numbers that gets everyone knickers in a knot ;)
 
Disaster_Area said:
I think it's B&H closes on Jewish holidays because the owners are Jewish... could that have anything to do with the "religious reasons"... I may be miss-remembering though. Personally I don't care, they're providing me a service, photography supply is not a right :) they can close whenever they want.

And just because a company doesn't currently employ any females, I don't think that should be used as proof they WON'T hire any. From the cross section of photographers I know the guys tend towards gear headed-ness while the girls tend to focus on the aesthetics of photography... maybe it makes the women better photographers but worse salespeople. On the other hand when I worked at Circuit City the girls usually out sold the guys (on average) because they took a less aggressive tack with customers, came off less like used car salesmen and nerdy guys who buy electronics have a harder time saying no to a girl.

Maybe it's just another frivolous lawsuit... or maybe the hiring manager is a chauvinistic pig. Point is I could be talking out of my ass and none of what I said is actually the problem because there's not much you can say definitively from another web sound bite that presents very little fact besides those big dollar numbers that gets everyone knickers in a knot ;)
Click to expand...

If a place as big as B&H has no female salespeople, they're discriminating. I worked at a tiny camera store in Santa Fe and we had 3 females salespeople and one of the managers was a woman. The little camera shop where I live in Indiana now has had a number of female salespeople over the years and currently has 2 women working there.
 
B&H has had problems going back several years shamming it's employees. Do a google search to read. I don't buy from them. They just sent me & my wife 2 nice catalogs that we didn't request. They went straight to be recycled.
And don't make the mistake that I did once jokinly making a commit about jews hoarding money, there's folks on here who will send you pm's & hate you even after you apologize! not that I care! Just warning you.
 
and I would agree with you if they haven't had any women working there in quite a while. What if they just happen to have none working there right now and someone's taking advantage of that. When I worked at Circuit City the turn over rate was VERY high... sometimes we'd have more guys than girls, sometimes we'd have non at all.

I'm not saying they're NOT being discriminatory, just that from the virtually nill amount of info from the article there's no way to be sure... but that's how the the media has always worked... give only the most controversial facts and let everyone make up the story that fits their personal ideology :)
 
They had issues with the labor board last year because they were paying their latino employees less than their white employees. I stopped doing business with them at that point. I am not surprised to find this out. It is a real shame (for adorama) that Adorama's phone people are so rude. These days, I do all of my business with KEH, even for new stuff, even though i pay a couple dollars more for new items from KEH than I would from adorama or b and h.
 
I like dealing with B&H - both online and over the phone, but I've never visited the store itself. I was just surprised to see their name mentioned in the business section of yesterday's paper, as well as the nature of the suit.
 
Chriscrawfordphoto said:
If a place as big as B&H has no female salespeople, they're discriminating. I worked at a tiny camera store in Santa Fe and we had 3 females salespeople and one of the managers was a woman. The little camera shop where I live in Indiana now has had a number of female salespeople over the years and currently has 2 women working there.
Click to expand...

Chris I hope they are smarter than a female saleswoman at a Wolf Camera that told me that they don't make 100 speed film anymore. (kodak ektar...duh!) Can't just blame the woman. There was a male sales clerk standing next to her. No wonder they, Ritz/Wolf Camera filed bankruptcy!
 
Greg, making a comment like that, even jokingly, in this day and age shows your ignorance and insensitivity. More so, by the fact you had to repeat it. B & H may have problems, I do not know what goes on behind the scenes, but they do employ women.
 
Last edited:
The last time I was in the store, I could swear I saw one or two female salespeople- but I could easily be wrong. I was a salesman at B&H myself between 2002 and 2005, and there certainly weren't any women working the sales floor then, although there were one or two female cashiers, and women working lots of other jobs. B&H does walk a fine line with the law and their religious practice, but it's going to be tough to get them to admit any real wrongdoing, whatever the case is. I'll bet this settles out of court.
 
gb hill said:
Chris I hope they are smarter than a female saleswoman at a Wolf Camera that told me that they don't make 100 speed film anymore. (kodak ektar...duh!) Can't just blame the woman. There was a male sales clerk standing next to her. No wonder they, Ritz/Wolf Camera filed bankruptcy!
Click to expand...

They were actually very knowledgeable. One was a professional artist and photographer who had a photography degree from the University of New Mexico (one of the best photo programs in the USA), the others were serious amateurs who knew their stuff.
 
kbg32 said:
Greg, making a comment like that, even jokingly, in this day and age shows your ignorance and insensitivity. More so, by the fact you had to repeat it. B & H may have problems, I do not know what goes on behind the scenes, but they do employ women.
Click to expand...


Hey Keith, how's the weather up there? That horse is mighty high.
 
gb hill said:
And don't make the mistake that I did once jokinly making a commit about jews hoarding money, there's folks on here who will send you pm's & hate you even after you apologize! not that I care! Just warning you.
Click to expand...

Oh if B&H wants to close on Jewish holidays because the owners are Jewish all the more power to them. It's their business not mine.. they don't come to my house and tell me not to work on Saturday... and if someone wishes me a Happy Hanukkah I'd say thank you very much and have a Merry Christmas... I'm not sure where the idea of religious tolerance got replaced by the idea of religious eradication... but I guess it's the same idea as "If you two kids can't play nice with your toys we'll take them all away, then who'll be happy"

... and of course we always ended up wishing we had our toys back and just learned how to share :)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom