Welcoming Committee

As part of my new job I spend a lot of time in Home Depot stores. I'm in charge of almost 40 across three states. It's important to visit them and have them get to know me as I continue to learn the ropes of my new role. However, that is increasingly difficult to do when I'm asked 20 times a day what happened to the old rep. "So and so was so nice and friendly",  "So and so was very knowledgeable and our customers loved him", "I'm going to miss him", blah, blah, blah. I understand there will be an element of that but it's daily and I'm now annoyed by it. Today when I arrived at a store to conduct an event to drum up business without being asked to do so, an associate immediately told me the old rep was very well liked around their store as his introduction to me. I just blurted out "Well, I'm sure I will be too once you get to know me." He simply smiled and walked away.

Give a girl a chance will ya?