Whatever Happened To Customer Service?

When I was a kid and first started in the working world, I was told "the customer is king". I was taught customer service at all of the jobs I held. Whether it was a restaurant or a store you went out of your way to help the customer because THEY were the reason the business stayed a float. I was shopping for a cart yesterday. The kind with pneumatic tires and steering like you'd use for gardening, only the 1000 lb variety. I found one at a local store on the parkway and wheeled it to the register. I was told I couldn't buy it. It was the display. I told the head cashier that I needed to use it right away and didn't have time to try to assemble the cart and then do the work I needed to do with the equipment. I was told that he would have to call the store manager, and then the store manager would have to call the District Manager. No phone calls were made and was made to put the cart away! I promptly left the store and traveled a little farther down the road to a similar store where they were more than happy to sell me the assembled cart. I had never been into the store I visited to begin with and will most likely never return. Would it have been such a big deal to the store to assemble another cart for display? They lost my money, and any recommend to others who might ask were I bought my equipment from. Have you had any negative customer service experiences? Would you go back after getting that treated like that?