Tales from the retail world...

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MrRamon

Senior member
Apr 28, 2006
342
4
81
Worked retail for only 4 years. Here is a wonderful story. When you beat projections everyone is high on life. When you don't beat projections the blame train trickles down.

Also, sometimes worked with customers and sometimes in the back. When I worked in the back I would check every box that was being thrown away. During my 4 years in retail I found roughly $20000 retail of stuff being thrown away including a $5,000 msrp diamond ring. I would end up getting yelled at for checking boxes that were supposedly empty as management said it was a waste of time. I might as well have kept everything instead of telling management.

Never again will I work retail.
 
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HeXen

Diamond Member
Dec 13, 2009
7,837
38
91
Never worked retail but have some funny stories of retail workers. I also like to troll BestBuy employees.
 

melons

Junior Member
Aug 8, 2015
3
0
0
Sorry, but even with track marks, you can't freakin catch any disease. How do you think we lab techs get by? We see this each and everyday. Anything that this women may have carried would most likely only be contracted thru blood to blood!!
 

DigDog

Lifer
Jun 3, 2011
14,622
3,001
136
thats a nice story only because in the end it worked out for him; it would be cringeworthy if he'd gotten fired, manager managed to spin his BS version of events, or in general crushed by the corporate machine. which is not at all uncommon.
 

Tweak155

Lifer
Sep 23, 2003
11,449
264
126
epic. must read for everyone.

Good read but way too long.

TLDR:

- OP sells kid vinegar (henceforth known as vinegar boy)
- Idiot kid drinks half the bottle and gets way sick
- Mom tries to blame OP and not her moron kid by saying he told Vinegar Boy it was safe to drink
- OP will not back down / admit fault / apologize
- 2 managers get involved - one senior and one territory
- Video proves OP did not say anything to the kid
- 2 managers still want apology which OP will not do, managers ridicule and fire the guy (basically) in front of moron mother. Mother is gleaming
- Idiot 2 managers leave OP nasty voicemails
- OP takes legal action (voicemails as help) and works with awesome owner who is on his side
- Lots of boring text takes place here, but basically the outcome is:
- OP gets some sort of settlement, Territory manager has to publicly apologize in front of store, senior manager is demoted, OP gets his job back with a raise, better benefits and back pay for all the time he was forced to take off and then bans the moron mother & family from store



I may have missed some details but that's the gist of it.
 

BUTCH1

Lifer
Jul 15, 2000
20,433
1,769
126
Good read but way too long.

TLDR:

- OP sells kid vinegar (henceforth known as vinegar boy)
- Idiot kid drinks half the bottle and gets way sick
- Mom tries to blame OP and not her moron kid by saying he told Vinegar Boy it was safe to drink
- OP will not back down / admit fault / apologize
- 2 managers get involved - one senior and one territory
- Video proves OP did not say anything to the kid
- 2 managers still want apology which OP will not do, managers ridicule and fire the guy (basically) in front of moron mother. Mother is gleaming
- Idiot 2 managers leave OP nasty voicemails
- OP takes legal action (voicemails as help) and works with awesome owner who is on his side
- Lots of boring text takes place here, but basically the outcome is:
- OP gets some sort of settlement, Territory manager has to publicly apologize in front of store, senior manager is demoted, OP gets his job back with a raise, better benefits and back pay for all the time he was forced to take off and then bans the moron mother & family from store



I may have missed some details but that's the gist of it.

Un-fucking-beleivable...Yea, I remember being 15 and dumb but drinking a bottle of malt vinegar?, nuts. Yesterday I bought a can of dust-off as every 6 months or so I like to blow out my HSF and general cleaning of the case, the self-serve scanner stopped with an "approval needed" message, girl comes over and approves it, I ask her what's up with the approval needed for dust-off, "The kids have been huffing it"...wow, did not know that.
 

Ferrari355

Golden Member
Jul 29, 2000
1,791
2,189
136
I work at a casino but luckily haven't had to deal with the same type of things other people in this thread have. The main thing that happens to me is people asking "do you work here" when it should be obvious because I wear a uniform, a name tag and a hat with the casinos name on it. The only bad thing I've seen so far was a drunk guy knocking over a bunch of the chairs by the slot machines and yelling at people.
 

TheGardener

Golden Member
Jul 19, 2014
1,945
33
56
I worked at a Wal Mart during college. I was walking out of the bathrooms in the back of the store when this HAAWWWWWWTTTT cashier came walking up rapidly towards the bathroom. I always flirted with her and was about to start some game when RECCCHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH she PUKED all over the floor and the front of the milk cooler. She had a stomach virus and the asshole manager wouldn't ler her leave. She was SO embarrased. It all worked out in the end as we got married Sept 18th last year. :thumbsup:


Reminds me of a Wayne's World quote.


Garth Algar: Uhm, Wayne? What do you do if every time you see this one incredible woman, you think you're gonna hurl?

Wayne Campbell: I say hurl. If you blow chunks and she comes back, she's yours. But if you spew and she bolts, then it was never meant to be.
 

DigDog

Lifer
Jun 3, 2011
14,622
3,001
136
Un-fucking-beleivable...Yea, I remember being 15 and dumb but drinking a bottle of malt vinegar?, nuts. Yesterday I bought a can of dust-off as every 6 months or so I like to blow out my HSF and general cleaning of the case, the self-serve scanner stopped with an "approval needed" message, girl comes over and approves it, I ask her what's up with the approval needed for dust-off, "The kids have been huffing it"...wow, did not know that.

*malt

kid obviously thought he was getting something similar to colt45, possibly on his first boozing ever, and didn't realized the horrible taste is not meant to be there.

btw, i love a nice sip of vinegar. i also like to sip soy, eat salt, and more gross stuff. mind f* from eating too much gourmet food.
 

lxskllr

No Lifer
Nov 30, 2004
60,003
10,488
126
Vinegar's awesome; in reasonable quantities. I could probably drink half a bottle of malt, but I wouldn't especially like to.
 

disappoint

Lifer
Dec 7, 2009
10,132
382
126
f-yeah.gif

what's the context of this gif? Everyone around her look to be in complete shock.

Looks like some awards ceremoney. Oprah's baby sister on the right rolling her eyes. Old lady top left corner mouthing the words "...some cock!" Lady in blue in the center top looking around to see if anyone else heard what that other lady said. Mostly everyone with the possible exception of a few drunks looking uncomfortable.
 
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chitwood

Golden Member
Aug 21, 2008
1,208
59
91
Gonna bump this thread again, I remember a story.

When I was 19 I had a job waiting tables at this mediocre BBQ restaurant. One saturday afternoon I was on a shift, with 2 other servers. Three servers for the entire restaurant, which made sense because we were never busy on Saturday lunch.

The hostess on the weekend day shift was this bitter, miserable old bat that no one liked. Well, as fate would have it this saturday, we were busy. Actually we were absurdly busy. Now, they way a restaurant hostess is supposed to approach this, is to seat maybe 4-5 tables, per server, and anyone else has to wait to be seated. First, so that the servers aren't waiting on 19 tables at once, and second, so customers aren't getting shitty service as a result.

Old Bat had no concept of this whatsoever. So, customers start flooding in. Old Bat is too stupid to understand the right thing to do, and just seats everyone. I think every table in the entire restaurant was filled. So, with three servers, we each have about 18 tables to wait on simultaneously. Our computer systems only allowed 9 open orders at a time, so we were furiously scribbling tabs on post it notes so we could enter them later. It was utter fucking chaos. I'm pretty sure at least 6 different tables left me a quarter tip or less because it was impossible to wait on that many people at once.

Around 4pm the owner shows up, as me and the other 2 servers are finishing our shift and attempting to repair our fractured sanity. All 3 of us tell the owner what happened, sure to include all the pissed off customers. Owner goes up to the front of the restaurant while the 3 of us untucked our shirts and clocked out. And.... never saw the old bat ever again after that.
 

John Connor

Lifer
Nov 30, 2012
22,757
619
121
LOL! Good story. Waiting tables sucks. I did it before at a Chinese restaurant. Before that I washed dishes. I can't tell you how much food people wasted. At the end of the day the whole trash can was full and weighed at least 350 pounds.

Far as retail. I worked at ShopKo back in high school in merchandise support. So I did carry outs and back stocked. Wasn't that bad really and I made nice tips near Christmas.