Tony M Dec 13, 2009:

Ah yes, I remember it well... Yes, indeed, J-M!

It was all very suggestive, and the potential double meaning of 'being served' was certainly included... along with Mrs Slocombe's pussy.

jmleger Dec 13, 2009:

Are you being served? Wasn't that the title of an old British TV series (which took place incidentally in a department store)? As I recall there was a wink-wink, nudge-nudge insistance of the verbe served...

Tony M Dec 13, 2009:

Watch out! It looks on the face of it as if this EN source text is in some way defective, so before you go too far, it might be best to clarify that.

These are possible responses from the customer, right?

So one would tend to expect 'would like to be served' (rather than 'service') — as Stéphanie says « qu'on s'occupe d'elle »

BUT there is also another possible error scenario:

"would like to be of service"

I admit this is a long shot, but it could be that the idea of the sales pitch is to evince a response in the customer that they would like to oblige the sales person; it's a sales technique that used to be used quite a lot, though I think people these days are more savvy, and it can probably only be done with great subtlety.

There is also the possibility that it might be "would like to be serviced" — though as that only usually applies to cars etc., it seems oddly out of place here, unless it's common in retail-speak?

So it would probably best to check what the original source text was meant to say, as I do strongly suspect an error of some sort.