I guess I am lucky. Our JoAnn's seem to have friendly staff a manager willing to jump in and help if needed. Also seem to have enough staff - except maybe for the hugh sales. They do use the number system at the cutting table. Seems to work for big sales. Just grab a number early and keep looking around. Even had one person give me a number he found. Mine was a lower number but I gave it to a friend whose number as higher. We had a piece of material that when we got to the cutting table 2 other people had seen and those were cut at the same time. We all had a good time and a nice chat with complete strangers.