Amazon was a setback to hands-on retail. It brought a kind of dishonor to the environment of a shop. Suddenly, time after time, people were asking for some help, then copying down the titles or products you had suggested, and then leaving without purchasing a single thing. They had not come to purchase; they had come to survey what they would later buy online. The quiet sorrow was the tacky, stained edge that it put between the shopkeeper and the customer. It was impossible to not feel something. And it became clear that you needed to have caution as you dealt with your customers. “How may I help?” turned into a sadly complicated exercise.