June 2014 - I Hate Working In Retail

By

23 Struggles Of Working In The Fast Food Industry

1. When some customers act all high and mighty simply because you have to take their order.

Yes, I’m making this food for you. No, you can’t treat me like shit.

2. When people use the drive-thru to empty out their piggy banks, leaving you with $15 dollars in coins.

Sir, I’ve got another order coming in over the headset, I have to make three milkshakes for you, and now I have to count all of this change. No.

3. When your chain restaurant adds new items to the menu, and everything’s place on the register changes.

Nickelodeon / Via rebloggy.com

“1-1-3 used to mean ‘Snickers Blizzard,’ but now it’s ‘6-piece chicken nuggets.’ Damn.”

4. Playing “rock, paper, scissors” with your coworkers to see who has to take out the trash versus clean the bathrooms.

NBC / Via google.com

5. When people ask “what toppings are on that type of burger” and you turn around and guess based on what the board’s picture looks like.

6. Not being able to hear someone ordering from the drive-thru because their engine is too loud.

Paramount Pictures / Via elitedaily.com

And they don’t turn off their engine no matter how many times you ask, so you defeatedly say, “please pull up.”

7. That goes double for the people who speak so softly when ordering, and you basically have to guess what they want.

Did they say “grilled chicken sandwich” or “large fry?” Ugh. I’ll just give them both.

8. When customers complain about their fries being cold despite them just coming out of the fryer.

ABC / Via dailycal.org

9. Or when they keep changing their orders after you put them in the register.

So you don’t want that crispy chicken anymore, or?

10. Even worse is when they get their food and then complain, saying, “I didn’t want cheese on my sandwich.”

NBC / Via dailyedge.ie

Then maybe you should have told me “no cheese.”

11. Having to stand on your feet for at least eight hours at a time and not being able to lean on the counter.

Disney / Via mommyish.com

Your back hurts, your feet are sore, and now you’re basically seeing spots.

12. When the customers forget how to form a single file line, and all hell breaks loose.

Columbia Pictures / Via wifflegif.com

I will not be your teacher. Follow simple first-grade rules and learn how to form a line.

13. Or when they actually form a line but the first customer has no idea what they want.

Nickelodeon / Via afunnyfeminist.tumblr.com

“I can help whoever is next AND READY.”

14. Waiting those painfully long six minutes for the deep fryer to cook that crispy chicken sandwich you need ASAP.

NBC / Via hercampus.com

I know you’re hungry, ma’am, but I can’t give you your sandwich right now unless you want it to be frozen solid.

15. Always being sticky, sweaty, and greasy when you get home.

Ah, what a glorious, sexy job.

16. Having to listen to the customer’s wrath when you tell them you’re out of a certain item.

Buena Vista Pictures / Via wishpicker.com

Hellllllll no.

17. Trying to sneak a loose fry or chicken finger when your manager isn’t around… and failing.

Fox / Via itsyowyow.com

18. When someone comes to the drive-thru JUST as the kitchen is about to close and orders a gargantuan amount of crispy chicken sandwiches.

DreamWorks / Via moviesandfood.tumblr.com

Kitchen: “Nope. Just tell them we’re out.”
You: “Sorry. We just ran out.”

19. Before working in fast food: smooth skin. After working in fast food: acne galore.

Disney / Via gurl.com

And it doesn’t matter how old you are.

20. Always smelling like grease and fast food, no matter how many showers you take.

The CW / Via collegetimes.com

21. The same goes for your work clothes, which are kept in a separate pile so their stench doesn’t contaminate your other belongings.

Disney / Via barnorama.com

22. Emptying your pockets at night and tallying up a whole 37 cents in tips. Wooh!

20th Century Fox / Via reactiongifs.com

So, basically just the change someone left at the drive-thru as they drove away.

23. And foregoing the daily urge to quit every time you have to clean up someone’s spilled drink or throw up off the floor.

Nickelodeon / Via j-14.com

Bonus points to you for surviving if the spill was on a carpeted area.

But, hey, at least you have amazing coworkers to go through these ups and downs with.

Illumination Entertainment / Via kintsukuroigenesis.tumblr.com

‘Cause someone’s gotta do the dirty work, and none do it better than you.

NBC / Via wifflegif.com

 

Sourced from buzzfeed.com

By

20 Ghastly Struggles Every Retail Worker Understands.

Here at the SF Globe, we love nostalgia pieces. If you’ve worked retail, you’ll grimace and laugh as we walk you through memory lane in hell, (cough, cough), we mean retail.

 

1. The Berating Customer

 

We’ve all experienced it: customers who think it’s a-okay to verbally assault the staff. “You work in retail. You’ll never amount to anything. You can’t even help me find the Ketchup!” or “You can’t even make a decent cup of coffee! I asked for four hazel nut pumps and two espresso shots. This is clearly three pumps of hazel nut!”

2. Being Treated Like A Stripper

I absolutely love it when customers throw their money at me like I’m a stripper. It makes my day. I also love it when they tap their credit card on the counter when I’m ringing their purchase. Am I going fast enough for you?

3. The Best Form Of Birth Control

 

Uploading…

Do you remember when you thought kids were cute? That was before you witnessed that little girl in a deceiving flowered dress who threw herself onto the floor in aisle 9 and screamed her lungs out.

4. Oh, Are You Closing?

 

Uploading…

Source Unknown

When a customer comes in at 8:59pm, and the store closes at 9:00pm. Am I open? What do you think?

5. Your Store Turns Into A Daycare

 

Uploading…

Source Unknown

If you worked in a bookstore, then you also remember being a babysitting service. When I was at Barnes and Noble, I got berated by a parent who’s child tore all of the pages from a book. I didn’t realize I was supposed to put on hold the responsibilities I was being paid for to watch her child.

6. Being Appreciated For All Of Your Hard Work, What? Wait. That Happens?

After working 9 hours on your feet all day, your boss tells you that you’re not doing enough. You’re not meeting your quota. Is customer service not part of my quota? Because that’s where all my time went.

7. The Great Pay – Gap.

 

Uploading…

Don’t you just love the pay from your retail job? With all the money you make you can afford to pay your student loans, your rent, utilities, food – wait, that doesn’t sound realistic.

8. Being On Your Feet, All-Day Long

Do you remember in elementary school when you couldn’t wait to get out from your desk and onto your feet? After 8-hour days on your feet, now all you want to do is veg out on the couch to reruns of Grey’s Anatomy and Scandal.9. The Fitting Room Nightmare

You won’t believe the disgusting things you’ll find in a women’s fitting room, unless you’ve worked retail. The protective stickers that lace the crotch of bathing suits, yup – stuck to the fitting room walls. Grosser than that, I almost puked the first time I saw a used pad lying on the fitting room floor. Dressing rooms aren’t bathrooms, ladies.

10. Mind-Numbing, Zombie-Like Slow Days

 

I love it when there’s absolutely nothing for me to do at work, and I can’t bring a book – or be on my phone. Those days are so much fun when I get to stand around from 9 to 5, watching the clock as it ticks second-by-second with nothing else to do.

11. Foot Fetish Calls
This is random, but it happened. I was getting ready for Black Friday and a woman called asking about boots. She asked me if I was wearing boots, and I was. That’s when the call got creepy. She asked me what they looked like. “They’re dark brown with lace up the sides and fur on top.” Then she started to breathe heavy. “That sounds nice. Do you wear them often?” I asked her if I could help her find specific boots. She continued to breathe heavy and then hung up.That was the creepiest customer call I have ever gotten!

12. When Customers Pay You In Change

 

Uploading…

Don’t you love it when customers take out a bag of change – taking the time to count it out, penny by penny, nickle by nickle? Once a customer paid $15.00 in unrolled change – at the end of my shift.

13. New Guy Trauma

Being the new guy in a retail job is great. The dirty looks people throw your way when you tell them you’re not currently hiring; regulars refusing to talk to you because they don’t know you; and being ignored when you ask someone if you can help them, only to have them find your manager to ask for help.

14. Clean Up In Aisle 10

Cleaning up anything on Aisle 10, 9 or a 1,001 is never fun, but I had the unpleasant experience of cleaning up an impressive sized pool of dog vomit in the pet aisle on my first day of work because my coworkers couldn’t handle cleaning it without almost vomiting themselves.

15. Seasonal Affective Disorder

 

Uploading…

What is the weirdest environment you’ve worked in? I worked part-time at a Halloween store one October and fake impaled bodies decorated the stock room. That was also the break room.

16. Dealing With Dirty Money

One thing I do not miss from retail work is handling dirty money that comes from the most ungodly places. Are you really pulling that twenty from beneath your sock to pay me? No thank you.

17. The Out of Stock Armageddon

 

All hell breaks loose when you tell a customer that what they want is out of stock or that you don’t carry it anymore. “But you had it last week. I can easily take my business elsewhere!” Please do, being rude to me won’t magically make what you want appear.

18. Being Dehumanized Feels Great!

 

I love being treated like a second class citizen. When I was a cashier, people would take the pens right out of my shirt pocket without asking. It was random, but also degrading. Did they not see me?

19. Returning Purchases

You don’t have a receipt? I’m sorry, I can’t *is interrupted by incessant yelling.*

20. When Working At A Clothing Store

Nothing is more infuriating than finding packages of Fruit of the Loom underwear and shirts torn open, thrown about and misplaced. Really? Must you rip it open?

Sourced from sfglobe.com

By

23 Ridiculous Customer Behaviors All Retail Workers Have Seen

how
I admit that the majority of my retail experience has been clothing-and-shoe based, but I’m sure there are equivalent horrors in stores of all kinds. I do think, however, there’s a special brand of insanity that overcomes customers upon entering a clothing store. Here, 23 things we’ve all seen in our time.

1. Leaving an enormous amount of clothing strewn around the floor of the dressing room — bonus points if they’re streaked with makeup! — and walking out as though nothing happened, not even trying to hand you their unwanted items.

2. Walking around the store and just sort of… putting something back on the shelf, about a half mile from where it’s supposed to go, in full view of an employee. (Why is just asking, “Hey, could you put this away for me?” at the very least not an option?)

3. Asking if they can “take something home and then call you with their credit card number.” ???

4. Asking to hold things for a week, and getting angry when the hold policy is no more than 24 hours.

5. Angrily informing an employee that “you have the item at the other store,” as though that is somehow going to make the item materialize in the next 10 seconds from sheer willpower.

6. Not believing an employee when they tell you in full certainty that they don’t have any more of a certain item in the back room. (Usually they are so adamant because they’ve already checked for one or more customers that day, and if you force them, they’re literally going to go in the back room, stare at the wall, and count to 10.)

7. Having everything short of a house party in a dressing room, despite being told clearly that your friends can’t go into the room with you.

8. Walking out onto the store floor and just kind of browsing around for a while wearing the clothes they’re currently trying on, barefoot and with tags sticking out everywhere.

9. Taking an item from the bottom of the stack, letting the entire stack topple over in front of them, and not even batting an eyelash.

10. Giving the “one-finger” sign to the cashier.

11. Getting in long, protracted arguments with the cashier about what “no refunds, exchange only” actually means, and why, no, we can’t rewrite the fundamentals of the company policy just so that you can get your 30 dollars back.

12. Blatantly attempting to return things that are beyond used and worn out.

13. Trying on an item that is clearly at least three sizes too small for them, and destroying the item in the process (and then leaving it on the floor, of course, because why not??).

14. Threatening to “call corporate” about a problem that the employee has no control over. Everyone should understand by the way that “calling corporate” is what every employee dreams a disgruntled customer will do, because it gets them out of your face and ensures that they will be sitting on hold for the next three hours.

15. Demanding to speak to the manager and, when informed that the person they’re yelling at is, in fact, the manager, not believing them.

16. Requesting giant bags and gift-wrapping for a three-ounce item that cost six dollars.

17. Trying on excessive amounts of clothing that they have no intention of buying strictly to take endless selfies in the dressing room. (Yes, the employees know when you’re taking selfies. Yes, they’re making fun of you.)

18. Cornering an employee to “ask them about something” which is basically a way to hit on them when they can’t escape.

19. Asking if they can get a “sample” of things that would never in any universe be considered samples.

20. Pitting the employees against each other by telling them that the “other one always does it” when one of them says that they can’t do something.

21. Ignoring signs that ask not to bring food — especially ice cream — into the store, and then dribbling ice cream down the front of several items.

22. Without asking, just leaving a giant cup of Starbucks at the front counter while they shop, until you have a little petting zoo of random Starbucks cups next to the cash register.

23. Generally talking to you as a retail employee like you are the temporary butler that they have personally hired, and not like you’re a representative of a company that has rules to abide by and a dozen other customers to be helping. You can always tell when someone doesn’t think retail is a “real job

 

Sourced from thoughtcatalog.com