The Universal Retail Constant

How about a quick observation?
On my last trip to get a haircut, I entered the establishment to find that besides the two workers and one older lady getting her hair done, I was the only other person there.  After being seated, I mentioned how I had been worried I was going to have to wait in a long line since I was coming in after most people were getting out of work.
The lady who was cutting my hair said that even though she would like more people coming in, it did afford her the time to do school work.  And that’s when I stumbled upon it – the one universal constant amongst retail workers (and barbers).  Love of down time!  The greatest thing one in the world of retail can look forward to.  Those brief moments where you find yourself not having to rush around doing three things at once or having to look busy so management leaves you alone.  The time where you can just stand around and shoot the shit with coworkers or skim the internet or glance at your homework or a book that you had stashed away.
Whatever it is, we can all agree that it’s better than what we are actually getting paid to do.  We’d rather be bored or doing other things than having customers come in and bother us – even if it meant giving us their money.
You tend to savor those fleeting moments like you were a parent looking forward to the five minutes your baby decides to nap.  We become inconvenienced even if a customer looks as if they’re approaching our department.
“I have to do my job now?” we all whine and huff, before dragging ourselves over to the customer(s).
You – okay, I – can’t even get through an entire six-hour shift without wistfully daydreaming of when I can get five seconds of down time.
Take this entry, for example.  It should’ve taken me just ten minutes to write but I stopped numerous times to go online or to daydream.  A half hour later and here I am!
[Another two minutes elapse.]
I guess I’ll just end this now.
More soon from the frontlines...

"Do You Work Here?"

One of my favorite questions I get when I work is, “Do you work here?”
I know the question is meant to imply “Do you work here… in this department?” but I always have to resist the urge to look down at my uniform that has the company logo on it and my name tag on it, before looking back up at the customer and asking, “What do you think?”  I don’t know about you, but I don’t go around wearing the work uniforms of places I don’t work at just so I can get stopped and asked ridiculous questions.  Or is that a thing?  Do some of you out there dress up in retail uniforms just to fuck with customers?  Because that would be HILARIOUS!
Maybe, like Jennifer Aniston in Office Space, I’m not wearing enough flair.  I should probably just wear multiple buttons that say, “Yes, I work here!” or “Ask me a question!” or “Hey, I’m not wearing this uniform for shits and giggles!”  That could cut down on the confusion.
Regardless, the obvious question shouldn’t be, “Do you work here?” it should be, “Can you help me?” or “Do you know somebody who can help me here?” or something along those lines.  Ah, the English language and all of its quirks.
There is also a flipside to this scenario & that occurs whenever I wear my work uniform into another company’s store.  Oddly enough, whenever that happens I never get asked if I work there.  It’s always just assumed I do.
“Can you tell me where you keep the cayenne pepper in jars?”
“Uh, I don’t work here.”
At this point the customer looks at your uniform a little closer – a uniform that is unbuttoned & un-tucked, mind you – and has a shocked look on their face.
“Oh, I’M sorry!  I just saw your uniform and thought you worked here.”
Yeah, I already got that part.
First, what if I was just a guy wearing a collared shirt that was unbuttoned and the same color as the store’s employees?  Whenever you go into a store where all the workers wear black shirts, do you ask anyone who wears a black shirt where something is?
Second, you’re too lazy to observe what somebody’s wearing and too rude to avoid asking somebody who would have to be off the clock to wear their uniform unbuttoned and un-tucked.
I’ve always been tempted to tell people the wrong answer if they ask me a question whenever this happens.
“Do you know what aisle the fabric softener is in?”
“Oh, yes!  It’s down aisle 56 on your left,” and then watch them scurry away down fifty-plus aisles to get to the one they’re looking for.  Ah, the laughs I’d have… if I had the knowledge that that same customer would never come into my job and remember what a dick I had been.  I might not have the spine for it but I sure hope someone out there tries this.  HAS anyone tried this?  If so, let me know how that went. 
Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to find my pieces of flair.
More soon from the frontlines...

Can You Read This For Me?

I’ve mentioned before how lazy I think humans have become.  For instance, I don’t even intend to edit this blog.  Then again, why start now, right? (ba-doom-cha)
I think, however, that the next story takes the cake.
I was working in our store’s appliance section for the day and had a customer approach me with a look that was equal parts apprehension and hope.  He proceeds to tell me that he purchased a gas stove about a month ago and had a few questions about how to use it.  I thought, “Oh, great, a product I’m not too familiar with and this guy is going to ask some oddball questions that not even the manufacturer has thought up.”
Once we walked up to the gas stove that he said looked identical to the one he purchased – besides the fact he bought one with five burners instead of the four that were on this one and the fact that the electronic displays were completely different, but other than that they were identical – and I braced myself.  So, it was to my surprise when he told me he wanted to know how to start the oven.  At first, I thought he was kind of fucking with me.  How do you start the oven?  Really?  Even I knew that one!
“Uh, well, let’s say you want to bake something.  You just hit the bake button and hit this button to increase the temperature.”
Holy shit, that was easy!
“That’s it?”
Yeah, genius!  That’s it.  Welcome to ‘Things I Learned When I Was Ten’.
“Yep,” I replied.
“Do I need to hit this ‘Bake Time’ button?”
Okay, a bit harder.  That’s when I stumbled upon an obvious solution.  The owner’s manual!  I knew that most of the appliances the store had on display had their manuals somewhere.  I first opened the oven door but came up empty.  I then opened the broiler drawer and – A-HA! – found what I was looking for.
“I’m not sure but the manual should say what to do.”
I made sure that that sounded as obvious as it should’ve been to anyone who has purchased anything in the past and had to consult an owner’s manual for an answer.  He could’ve saved himself a trip to the store if he just broke open the manual.  What was this guy thinking?
“Ah, yeah, I know we could’ve looked through it but it’s so long and confusing.  You can never figure those things out.”
Sure, if you were looking up how to bring a space shuttle back down to Earth but we’re talking about a stove.  The manual was less than 25 pages long and it’s not like it was in four-point font.  If you cut out the small print at the end that nobody pays attention to, the pertinent information only account for about 20 pages.  And if you cut out all the pictures, then you’re down to about half that of actual instructions.  I found the answer in less than thirty seconds.  But that was too confusing?
See what I mean?
You have to spoon-feed people.  Nobody seems to want to do anything for themselves any more.  I think I’m going to rent myself out for reading services.
“WILL READ FOR MONEY.  WILL READ INSTRUCTION MANUALS, CHILDREN’S BOOKS, NOVELS, NEWSPAPERS, BLOGS, I-TUNES FINE PRINT, STREET SIGNS, ETC., ETC…”
In a world of lazy fucks, I’d be rich!  Rich I tells ya!
Feel free to use this idea for your own monetary pursuits.  However, if I see any advertisement like that in my area, I’m asking for 10% commission.
More soon from the frontlines...

Equality Among All

     I suppose my first real entry should be about equality. Young or old, fat or skinny, black or white - entering into a retail store makes everyone equals in my eyes. I’m not talking about equal rights or the like, either. I’m talking about everyone is equally stupid. In all my years working in various retail jobs, I have noticed that no matter how intelligent the person is supposed to be, walking through those doors drains a person of basic comprehension skills.
     It is the most amazing thing to witness. I’ve come to the conclusion that a very long time ago, retail CEOs made some sort of pact with the devil to create a magical entryway that would drain people of their intelligence. How else can you explain people entering a store and buying every single “As Seen On TV” product known to man? Shake weights? Really?
     Let’s take a grocery store, for instance. Every aisle is labeled with a general list of what you can find in each one. That’s not even including the big giant departments: produce, meat, bakery, etc. Yet, a person will take two steps into the produce department and ask the first employee, “Where are your tomatoes?”
     “Uh, turn your head to the right. See that table two feet from you?”
     People enter a store and lose all sense of self-reliance. Laziness and stupidity go hand-in-hand in the retail world. They cannot, for whatever reason, find even the most generic item on their own. They’d rather be told where the item is. If someone could program a GPS unit to tell people where items are located in a particular store, they would make a killing. A store could post ten million signs telling people where products are and they still wouldn’t be able to find the item they’re looking for.
     The worse is when I notice people pick up a product, walk ten feet, and then put the product down because they don’t feel the need to return the product to the right location. Does that printer ink look like it belongs with the candy bars at the register? I don’t think so, super genius. No matter how far a product may be located, if I decide to change my mind on a product, I return the product to the location. The poorly paid workers at the stores have more to get done in a day than return your can of peas because you left it in the paper towel aisle.
     I also find myself dumbing down a lot of explanations to customers just so I am sure they comprehend everything I’m telling them. I’ll even talk slower at times to make sure what I’m saying is sinking in for them. It’s not that I’m trying to insult them but when I see only a dim awareness of what I’m saying, I grow discouraged and realize I have to explain things like I‘m talking to a ten year old. I’m even more discouraged when I hear, “I don’t understand,” to the simplest of explanations. How do you dumb down a statement that’s dumbed down as far as it’ll go?
     If you think I’m exempting myself from all of this, you’re wrong. But I try to change my ways as much as possible. Not only that, but I’ll pick up the slack for others. If I see product in the wrong location, depending on how close I am to where it really belongs, I’ll return it. If I see garbage on the ground, I’ll sometimes pick it up. It drives me nuts when I have to pick it up at my job, so I feel it’s good karma to do it for my brethren in arms who work at these stores. This does not always work when I’m on the job, however. There are plenty of times that I see a piece of paper or tissue paper on the ground and think, “Do I really want to bend down to get that?”
     Laziness. I’m telling you, those swinging, rotating, or sliding front doors are hexed with some sort of curse put on them. I just came up with the plot for Ghostbusters 3. You’re welcome Dan Akroyd.
     Thankfully, this first major hurdle is easy to combat. If you have a question about location of a product, just look up. There most likely will be a sign hanging down that states where the product is. Self-reliance is a good thing. By all means, don’t hesitate to ask questions, obviously, since answering questions is part of the workers’ job code. But don’t ask stupid questions you can clearly find out on your own. You’ll gain the respect of those who work there and they might even be more willing to help you out if you make an effort to find something first.
     If you don’t want a product, just walk a few steps back to where you got it. Trust me, America, we’ve all seen the news about how we’re the fattest nation on the planet. You can use those extra steps. Or at least just tell an employee you didn’t want a product and, generally, they’ll return it. Better to return it during the day than having to discover it a minute before they punch out for the day. Just think of it this way if you work in an office: would you like it if your boss brings you a stack of papers that need to be filed five minutes before you’re supposed to leave for the night?
     Laziness and stupidity will be recurring themes here, but this is a good start, no?
     More soon from the frontlines…