Positive Pony Encounters!

[kirstinb]

Not sure if this is the correct forum... but...
I'm relatively new to the forums, I don't know if I looked hard enough, but I was wondering if everyone could share a story about an encounter they had with a stranger handling ponies with them. Example: checking out ponies at a store, post office... etc, anywhere when strangers see your ponies. (?) I know there are some bad encounters, but it would be fun to talk about our positive ones! I'll start first!

At Walmart, I tend to ALWAYS use self-checkout... I'm not ashamed... I just would not rather have the cashiers say anything negative and have it annoy me. But while shopping with my mom, we had lots of groceries. She made me go first, and I intended to pay for my own stuff first. Awkwardly, I plopped down two trading cards, four blind bags, various ponies... "Let's get this over with" attitude. And the young lady (25?) behind the counter says,

"Oh, who's My Little Ponies are these for?"
I said "Oh, me".
"I love My Little Pony, I used to watch it when I was just a little girl... and I had all the little ponies..."
And she went on, and on, and on just talking to me about the cutest little things, talking about MLP now, and talking about her little ponies... and she said she thought it was cool that I was into things not many girls my age are (18). I was blushing by this time, so moved somebody actually had something nice to say about my hobby.

My next time was when I was at the post office, shipping off someone's trading cards from a trade I did. They loved Pinkie Pie... so yeah, I kinda covered the package in Pinkie Pie stickers. I handed the package to the woman, covered in little ponies... she must have thought it was cute, and she smiled, yet did not say anything. It made me very happy!

Your turn! Go!

[partypony566]

I've never had a negative reaction.....just the usual 'oh I loved ponies when I was little' I've even got a friend into collecting them too

[hathorcat]

I haven't had a negative attitude to be honest either I guess years and years of collecting ponies just makes you out, proud and pretty hardened maybe!

However, I have had some cute positive situations not as a buyer but as a giver. My mum works for a local charity which runs a dozen or so shops in our area. During a recent group order I ended up with about 12 Rarity and Gem Carriage sets minus their Star Swirls as people had chosen to just have the small pony shipped to them rather than the large box. I was a little stuck as to what to do with all these Rarity's so donated them to my mums shops. A couple of weeks after the donation, 1 of the shop managers had phoned in to the office to tell my mum that they had had a delighted mum just leave the shop - she hadnt been able to afford to buy the set for her daughter but now had managed to get it at their shop for just a fraction of the price with the money going to charity...made me feel really good - that little girl got her toy and the mum only had to spend what she could afford with the money to a good cause!

[Shenanigans]

Awww, these stories *gush*

I don't think I've had any positive ones, but no negative ones either. I've met a few people off the Arena IRL so that was a postive experience!!

[Jocelyn]

I was buying a couple G4s at KMart, and the cashier asked me, "Did you know My Little Pony has been around for a long time? 30 years! A long time!" Then she started to talk nostalgically about how her daughter used to just love ponies back in the day and that it was nice to see little girls today playing with the same stuff. I look like I'm of the age that wouldn't know anything about ponies beyond the newest stuff, so even though I have a whole bunch of G 1 s I pretended to be astonished. Too shy, I suppose. Still, really made my day

[Galactica]

Those are such cute stories!

I guess I have had a positive encounter-  last year I went to Comic Con in Seattle and wore some little rainbow wings, had a blue wig on-  and I think I had on some ears and a horn that I had purchased there (there was a ton of MLP stuff)  I wasn't really dressed up other than that-

but as I was leaving the convention center, a couple with a very small kid (I want to say 3-4?) approached me and asked if I was a "My Little Pony" and if so- would I mind if they got my pic with their daughter since she LOOOVED MLP.   I wasn't exactly a MLP but was happy to oblige.




 

[Summer-blade]

I have a few stories I can share

I work in a grocery store Bakery I have to were a belt cause I'm fianly! losing a little weight so I got a pony belt a pair of my co-workers saw it and were like "oh cool! I love that show!" and I ended up finding out there were two bronies in my store.
And then only a few days ago a woman came in to order a cake for her daughter, her little daughter was with her. The little girl was about to turn 4 and she declared she wanted a pony cake, I smiled and asked " do you like ponies?" I got a shy nod as a response and I told her I liked ponies too.
Her mom smiled and we talked about the ponies we used to play with when we were little.

My boss found out I make custom ponies so I made one for his friend in the deli afterwards I had to start making custom ponies for other people in the store because everyone loved them.

 I ship a lot at the local post office and one day I was talking to the lady that works the desk and she told me her daughter had a lot of the old ponies when she was little. Unforcantly for one such pony the woman's son hid it in the oven broiler to play a trick on his sister and mom didn't check the oven first and the pony got kinda sorta...broiled and melted. I might ask the lady if she remembers what pony it was so I can hunt down a new one for her daughter.     

[Linnzy]

Whenever I bring up my Barbie-collection people seem to be more interested and fascinated rather than negative.

I once had a looong talk about it with a guy at a cafe'...I didn't knew they guy we just started talking but how we ever came to the topic...I don't remember!

[Rachel-Eyes]

These stories are just too cute! ^^ I don't think I've ever gotten a negative response and I openly share pictures of my collection on Facebook.

I also got to meet DonkeyGirl2002 IRL! She lives in my area and we both ran into each other at TRU looking for the next Blind Bags! That just makes me so happy! We both couldn't believe that we ran into another Arena member!

Also, I have a boss who loves toys. He wants to collect but hasn't really gotten started yet, but we had a huge conversation one night about toys and how appealing they are.

[jwalraven]

Just tonight I went to the commissary to grab a few groceries when a big burly sergeant looking guy (not in uniform) and his daughter (about 7-8 years old) came out. He saw my shirt (a G4 one) and said to me "That's a good show!" All the while the girl was grinning.

[Kaeldre]

A friend and I were at TRU over the summer wandering up and down the pony isle.  This girl, about our age, starts frantically searching the shelves.  She sees us and asks, "Do you guys know where I can find the pony trading cards?"  My friend and I spout off all the places we saw them and exactly where they were in the stores.  She thanked us profusely, we wished her luck, and she was on her way.  I wonder if she found what she was looking for.

[ApertureScience]

Somebody at the post office questioned me about my Blind Bag Minty necklace and then mentioned that she watched the show with her daughter.  I believe she said that Pinkie Pie was her favorite.

I also met some really cool Bronies at GameStop once and we spoke about the show for a good 15-20 minutes.

[Winter Bones]

Most of these don't involve shopping or the toys, but I suppose they still count. I remember one time my SO was wearing a pony shirt and got a brohoof from a random girl on the bus; we also ran into a brony cheering at us from his bicycle as he rode past us downtown. Probably the best one was when the both of us were leaving a TRU after pony hunting, and a little 2 year old boy pointed at my SO's pony shirt and kept repeating 'Wainbow dash! Wainbow dash!' to his parents, it was pretty cute. Pony shirts attract a lot of attention, apparently, but I still don't wear any myself. I wish I had more stories about collectors or older gen fans, but I have yet to run into some.

[Galactica]

Those are all great stories!  I like the sergeant story a lot- hehe

 

[baby_yoyo]

Ive done 2 toy fairs recently to sell off my collection to raise some much needed wedding pennies, I had  2 lovely encounters:

Husband and wife team - wife sees my stall and literally has a heart attack seeing all the g1's, her husband rolls his eyes until she picks up Starshine and is nearly in tears as it was her first MLP but it got pinched when she was at school and never got it back. Her husband then bought it for her there and then, the wife couldn't thank me enough for bringing Starshine along

Husband, Wife and 2 year old daughter: Wife squeals when she sees my boxed Lullaby Nursery, saying it was her favorite play set when she was growing up. The husband said that they couldn't really afford it as they had only brought money to spend on their little girl.

Wife walks away quite sad.................husband sneaks back and pays for it asks me to put it under my stall until they've done wandering round the fair. They walk back an hour later and the wife looks gutted that the Nursery is now gone from the stall, until I take it from under the stall and hand it to her She is elated and promises to play with it with her daughter when she's old enough

I have another toy fair in a few weeks lets hope I can reunite more people with childhood ponies