The sales associate shifts her gaze off to the side just as the customer approaches. Suddenly she is intent on restocking merchandise or discussing when she will take her next break — anything to avoid actual contact with a shopper. It’s the type of behavior that galls customers and dominates the list of complaints cited in the second annual Retail Customer Dissatisfaction Study conducted by Wharton’s Jay H. Baker Retail Initiative with the Verde Group, a Canadian consulting firm. The study found that disinterested, ill-prepared and unwelcoming salespeople lead to more lost business and bad word-of-mouth than any other management challenge in retailing. “There are a variety of different triggers for having a bad shopping experience, including things like parking or how well the store is organized. Some of those things retailers can do something about and some of them they can’t.…