The Retail Horror Thread 2: More Tales to Chill your Bones

[Bugaboo]

Don't you learn where milk comes from in preschool? Don't they have like picture books saying "chickens make eggs, cows make milk and sheep make wool"

 

[yasscat]

I know, right? I told this to my mom and she said, "What, are they not taking kids on field trips to the farm anymore?" There is a LOT of farmland around us, easily enough that you should definitely know where milk, eggs, or whatever come from even if somehow you never learned it in school.

A few minutes later, another co-worker and I were talking about Weird Al, and Milk Eggs Girl had not only never heard of him, but didn't know what "parody" meant. Like, "wasn't even close when trying to repeat the word" level of unfamiliar with the word "parody".

The worst part is, she has a second job at a grocery store, so that's twice the chance that her idiocy will spread...

I gave that post the "drink" rating because jfc that makes me want to weep for humanity. And then have many drinks.

 

[Rabbit Bones]

Working at pet stores and vet clinics seem fun when you're an animal lover, but they're seriously soul crushing. I was a vet tech for two years, and the abuse and neglect some people show for their animals is heart wrenching. It wasn't a retail job so I won't dump them in this thread, but there were several times I wanted to smack the shit out of clients.

 

[Bugaboo]

I don't remember if I had said this but when I was working at a pet store fucking people kept coming in and asking how to care for baby red eared sliders they found crossing the road. Mother fucker you put that shit back because
-It's illegal to take a wild animal from the wild and keep it in captivity without a lisence in Ontario and to get a lisence you need to be a vet of some sort doing wildlife rehab
-The turtles weren't injured, they were just a babies crossing the road, just pick them up, put them at the other side and drive away
-Red eared sliders get fucking massive, males are smallest and they need at least a 75 gallon tank
Also some lady brought in a native salamander (a jefferson's salamander which are locally endangered) to a reptile rescue and she was all like "TAKE THIS NEWT" she woke it up from it's hibernation in a window well, where they open hibernate, put it in water and tried to shove crickets down it's throat and she didn't understand why it wasn't eating. Um, because it was in hibernation mode, it's not gonna eat.
And fucking people keep taking wild toads and frogs and coming into the pet store asking what to feed it and I'm like "put it back right now" and they make excuses as to why they can't like "oh, it's a baby" or "I found it an hour away" or "it's wild instincts are gone because it was in captivity" bitch, frogs ain't nothing but instincts frogs are dumb as shit put all your wild critters back where you found them and stop asking me what to feed them

 

[Rabbit Bones]

Ug. People who aren't herp knowledgeable but get them anyway are the absolute worst. People would bring in tortoises with horrific pyramiding, and not understand that tortoises need special lighting (which, I live in fucking Arkansas. Just get a dog pen and let it hang outside a few days a week) and a diet of more than iceberg lettuce and tortoise food pellets. One stupid bitch brought in a full grown ball python that she thought was sick because it was stick thin and didn't move much. Turns out she'd been feeding it two pinkies every few weeks. He really should have been on one or two mediumish rats. He was also so dehydrated he wasn't shedding properly... he had layers of retained eyecaps. Luckily, when I asked her if I could keep him she agreed. I got him nice and fat and found a good home for him with a friend.

 

[Bugaboo]

Ug. People who aren't herp knowledgeable but get them anyway are the absolute worst. People would bring in tortoises with horrific pyramiding, and not understand that tortoises need special lighting (which, I live in fucking Arkansas. Just get a dog pen and let it hang outside a few days a week) and a diet of more than iceberg lettuce and tortoise food pellets. One stupid bitch brought in a full grown ball python that she thought was sick because it was stick thin and didn't move much. Turns out she'd been feeding it two pinkies every few weeks. He really should have been on one or two mediumish rats. He was also so dehydrated he wasn't shedding properly... he had layers of retained eyecaps. Luckily, when I asked her if I could keep him she agreed. I got him nice and fat and found a good home for him with a friend.

The hillbilly I bought my tarantula from was feeding her a few times a week, she's an adult female and that is redonkulous. She had no water, chunks of bark for substrate and the cage she was in was barely bigger than her. Also he said he was scared of her biting him so he handled her with gloves on, she's the sweetest most docile tarantula I've ever seen in my life you can barely get her to go after crickets (except today when she jumped from halfway across the tank to get one which is unusual for her)
Anyway to stop the clogging up of this thread I'm going to make a "pet shop and pet ownership horror stories thread" because hot damn I got plenty of those
Edit: I dun it. Come in and share your pet related horror stories

 

[ToroidalBoat]

I don't work in retail, but I have a couple of stories I can recall.

At a checkout line, I was behind a lady who had a cart full of stuff, and a sign reading "pick another lane, honey!" - apparently some kind of marketing research.

Then there was another time where I wanted to use a photo printing kiosk at the same store. I believe I posted this story before. Anyway, the kiosk was always breaking down, and it had previously been down for weeks. I go there to print some pictures, and there's this couple there. They tell me they had literally hundreds of pictures to print. I come back about an hour and a half later, close to closing, and they were still printing - not even half done, IIRC. The kiosk broke down soon after that again. At least when I finally printed my pics after that, the store gave me a discount coupon. Apparently, they were giving them to a lot of people because of the obviously poor maintenance of the kiosk.

 

[For The Internet]

I kind of love this.

The idea of a sweet little grandma carrying rats around in her sleeves warms the cockles of my heart.

Rat sperging ahead!

Spoiler

I love rats, I'm down with people giving their ratties treats like that and loving them to the degree they deserve love..,

... that said, it is a terrible idea to bring rats to public places and especially food establishments. For one thing, the place could get shut down for a code violation. A lot of people are not just disgusted by rats but are legitimately phobic about them. On top of that, the rat could escape if it's not in a cage, get spooked and run off. Rats are commonly believed by people to carry a lot of diseases and people see them as dirty. Even though wild rats are usually very healthy and rats are extremely clean creatures (they clean themselves more times a day than cats!), the majority of people have no way of knowing your rats are clean, healthy little guys who came from a breeder.

Rats are by far my favourite animals, I adore them and advocate for them to anyone who will listen, but I have never in the almost 14 years I've owned them brought them into a store or restaurant out of consideration for others as well as for their own protection.

 

[guau]

They are not really horror stories, but they are stories none the less. I worked at a charity shop for a little while, place was fine, manager was a boho hippy who played in a folk band. I just did all sorts at the store, mainly re-arranging stock.

One day, we got these trainers in. Boho hippy manger did not know the exact value of said trainers and told me to put them in with the other men's shoes (We did have a designer clothes section but it was small). Little after they were placed on the shelf, they were stolen. Now I was at the back of the store sorting out clothes from the donation bin (more on that later) so I did not see the event happen.

Turns out they were a really sought after pair that can run to £200 a pair.

Co-worker who I found really fucking annoying started accusing me of not stopping the thief like I had some extreme X-ray vision plus SHE was the one on the shop floor when it happened. Boho manager was in tears for the rest of the afternoon, poor guy.

I told you guys that most days I worked out back sorting out the donation bags seeing what items we could sell in the store. Well, even for a really posh area no one took care of their clothes. Stains and tears everywhere. Guys I know it's a charity shop but at least wash the clothes before you send it to us. One pair of jogging bottoms was so dirty I think I saw a semen stain on it.

I have other stories from my forays to work but they are for another time. I have quite a few from the local job centre in which I worked, but they are not retail.

 

[Cosmos]

Working at pet stores and vet clinics seem fun when you're an animal lover, but they're seriously soul crushing. I was a vet tech for two years, and the abuse and neglect some people show for their animals is heart wrenching. It wasn't a retail job so I won't dump them in this thread, but there were several times I wanted to smack the shit out of clients.

This is pretty much what keeps me from being a vet/vet tech. I've actually had a lot of people say "Why don't you just become a vet since you already love animals so much?" and I'm just like "Yeah, it's because I love them so much that I couldn't handle being a vet." I have to change the channel every time that soul-crushing Sarah McLachlan animal shelter commercial comes on, I don't think I have the emotional strength to witness that shit firsthand.

I have nothing but respect for the people who devote their lives to caring for animals. I also have nothing but contempt for the people who neglect and abuse them.

 

[Red]

So at my previous job, we had a client who had a weekly standing order. Basically we were a small business and we'd be happy to take special orders for clients. She would come in every week for her case of frozen dog food.
Our store offers a case discount. It's hardly a discount, it's just if you buy twelve (or twenty-four, depending on the size) cans of food that are all the same price, instead of being charged for the individual cans you'll be charged for the case, which is a 5% discount from buying them individually.
Now, this discount only applies of you are getting loose items and purchasing them as a case. It's not picking up an unopened case and getting 5% off the displayed price. The price on the unopened case is the discount price, you're still saving your money.
This lady did not understand that. Every time she ordered a case of food through us she'd insist on getting 5% and wouldn't listen to reason. She'd start a huge fit and demand to see the manager and hold up the line for our single register. At first we'd alert one of the managers when she came in so they could deal with her at the register, but then she started coming at night when the managers aren't around. All of the might people were given "how to deal with Sandi" talks after this lady apparently bullied one of our part-timers who was like 16 into giving her a discount undesputedly. Poor thing.
As she continued to come in at night she'd recognize new people and start to request more and more obsurd things, and there were a couple new people who she deceived into believing she got a 10% discount. She'd wander around the store until a less experienced or quieter
worker was at the register and then check out. She knew I didn't give her her discount and would ignore her tantrums and help the person behind her, so she waited until I got up to face shelves or take dinner.

This all seemed to stop when the manager was filling in a night shift with me and we both stared her down as she entered. Manager pulled her aside since the store was empty and I couldn't be happier.

 

[XYZpdq]

I know, right? I told this to my mom and she said, "What, are they not taking kids on field trips to the farm anymore?" There is a LOT of farmland around us, easily enough that you should definitely know where milk, eggs, or whatever come from even if somehow you never learned it in school.

A few minutes later, another co-worker and I were talking about Weird Al, and Milk Eggs Girl had not only never heard of him, but didn't know what "parody" meant. Like, "wasn't even close when trying to repeat the word" level of unfamiliar with the word "parody".

The worst part is, she has a second job at a grocery store, so that's twice the chance that her idiocy will spread...

And here I thought hearing someone looking at the spice aisle unironically quoting Marge Simpson about "or-uh-gone-oh" was something. She threw in a "PAP-rick-uh" for good measure, too.

 

[Tehshigelisok]

Here's one from when I was a little kid. We had an A&P supermarket in town that closed when I was about 5. About a year later, it reopened as a no-name. I remember one day, we drove by, and noticed that for all intents and purposes, it appeared to be very much open. Lights on, signs up, merchandise stocked, everything. We get ten feet in the door and a cashier stops us, saying, "We're not open for business yet, we're just training the workers." I remember my mom thinking, "so why didn't they lock the doors, or maybe put up a sign in the doors saying that they weren't ready yet?" This has still baffled her and me to this day, as we've never encountered something like this.

After about a year as a no-name, the store became part of a regional chain that went under abruptly in 2006. They actually closed the store up with merchandise still in it. But unlike the horrifying fate of the Mexia Supermarket in Fort Worth, Texas, anything perishable was cleaned out almost within a day, and the store was reopened for a single Sunday afternoon to sell off everything that was still good at a deep discount. After that, the place was gutted, and another grocery store has since moved into the building.

 

[Bluebersaur]

Out of the few jobs I've had in life thus far, two have been retail. My first was working at a local KMart down my street.

Got a few stories but since it's late and I have an early work shift, I'll stick with just dropping in one for now.

Spoiler: Long-ish Story

Now while I worked there we generally didn't have a massive issue with people leaking their bodily fluids all over the floors and stalls and messily in the bathrooms or anything like that. However, there was a day a mother was neglecting to take her son (probably 4 or 5 years old) to the restroom despite his heavy whines of having to go. They were up front where the store had all their birthday cards and the like.

Deciding not to wait on his mother any further, the boy proceeded to whip down his pants and underwear and pissed all over the floor in the aisle. The mother didn't even attempt to stop him but was quick to exit the building once he was finished.

We at least had a nearby wet floor sign that we placed by the sizeable piss puddle while waiting for someone to run and grab cleaning products. Due to how abnormally busy that shitstain of a store got, though, nobody could just stand guard and we eventually got called off to help others.

Me and another co-worker, let's call him A, ha barely gotten fifty feet away when we heard a sort of thud coming from where we had just placed the sign. After a brief look at each other, I told him I'd grab what we had been called to go get and he could see what happened, so A jogged back on over to the aisle in question to see if maybe something had fallen (there was a display at the end of the aisle that we thought might have gotten knocked down)

Turns out a rather hefty black woman had moved the wet floor sign and proceeded to step into and slip in the child's wizz pool.

A was nice enough to help her up off the ground, and she immediately took to walking with a hunch and a limp while complaining of her back hurting. They took her to file a report, and she had tried to claim the sign was never there and we were at fault. I imagine she was attempting to file a lawsuit against the company and sue them for her injuries, but the whole incident had been on camera and I never heard anything come of it.

Mother, the kid, and the heavy lady were never spotted again, at least not while I had been there.

 

[Tehshigelisok]

Yet another one with Milk Eggs Girl. Today I learned that she doesn't know how to read a clock. She's constantly asking "what time is it?" even when she's LOOKING AT THE DAMN CLOCK HERSELF. It's a basic black and white clock with an hour, minute, and second hand. No Roman numerals, no birds in place of the numbers, no weird shapes for the hands.

Also, she managed to spray Big Mac sauce all over the ceiling earlier, and in telling me that she did so, it took her a good 20 seconds to think of what sandwich the Big Mac sauce goes on. (Spoilers: It ain't the Quarter Pounder with Cheese.)

What makes this even worse is, she seems to be quite good at basic math. I constantly see her count out the mozzarella sticks (yes, my McDonald's sells mozzarella sticks; no, they aren't very good) and she can tell almost immediately if they don't come out to a multiple of 3, which happens sometimes if we get one that's unsuitable for selling to a customer (didn't cook all the way through, dropped on the floor, etc.). We also had a huge order come in just before the end of my shift, which had 8 of one sandwich, 4 of another, 2 of a third, and 1 of a fourth. She was standing at the bun toaster, and right away, she said "I'll put down 15 buns." Also, she is otherwise a competent worker, and unlike A. S. whom I mentioned earlier in this thread, I've never seen her slack off.

It's that last paragraph, combined with my naturally optimistic outlook, that gives me at least a little glimmer of hope that she'll get better.

 

[Dunsparce]

Not from me but from someone I know IRL: They worked at the deli inside the local Meijers(A Midwestern US competitor to Wal-Mart that is superior in every way) and there are table where you can eat what you buy there, one day this very overweight guy ordered an entire chicken and ate it at the store while reading the newspaper. When he was done he just left his stuff there and so this person cleaned it up. About an hour later there was some crashing and this guy was throwing trash and half-even meat everywhere to find his newspaper and he was screaming at this person for daring to throw it away. He was escorted out the store but this person had to clean up the entire mess he made.

 

[The Master Debater]

Every week he came in, and bought pantyhose, KY lube, two packs of condoms, and several enemas. Sometimes he got panties as well.

I know it's late but you can order those online...

 

[Coldgrip]

Yet another one with Milk Eggs Girl. Today I learned that she doesn't know how to read a clock. She's constantly asking "what time is it?" even when she's LOOKING AT THE DAMN CLOCK HERSELF. It's a basic black and white clock with an hour, minute, and second hand. No Roman numerals, no birds in place of the numbers, no weird shapes for the hands.

Also, she managed to spray Big Mac sauce all over the ceiling earlier, and in telling me that she did so, it took her a good 20 seconds to think of what sandwich the Big Mac sauce goes on. (Spoilers: It ain't the Quarter Pounder with Cheese.)

What makes this even worse is, she seems to be quite good at basic math. I constantly see her count out the mozzarella sticks (yes, my McDonald's sells mozzarella sticks; no, they aren't very good) and she can tell almost immediately if they don't come out to a multiple of 3, which happens sometimes if we get one that's unsuitable for selling to a customer (didn't cook all the way through, dropped on the floor, etc.). We also had a huge order come in just before the end of my shift, which had 8 of one sandwich, 4 of another, 2 of a third, and 1 of a fourth. She was standing at the bun toaster, and right away, she said "I'll put down 15 buns." Also, she is otherwise a competent worker, and unlike A. S. whom I mentioned earlier in this thread, I've never seen her slack off.

It's that last paragraph, combined with my naturally optimistic outlook, that gives me at least a little glimmer of hope that she'll get better.

Sounds like she might be on the autism spectrum.

 

[Reddit Avenger]

Oh boy I got a pretty fantastic story from a whopping 2 days ago. A little background (in case you didn't read a couple of my other posts), I work at a K-mart as a cashier and it sucks. Anyways I had the closest thing to a night shift you get (like 2:30-10pm) and it was about 45 minutes before the store closes and I'm tired as fuck since I want to just pass out since I didn't get any sleep last night because my brain hates me.

Anyways I'm just checking some lady out and behind her I see some short mexican guy who looks like some obligatory cartel dude who you have to blow up at some dockside warehouse in every GTA game ever made, with 2 entire fucking carriages literally filled to the fucking brim with shoes. Like no boxes, just shoes. As it turns out we've been having a 'buy one get another for $1' promotion for shoes and I guess this guy owned like a flea market table or something and felt like flipping every fucking shoe in the store.

Shit was awkward since the dude didn't speak english and was constantly muttering shit in spanish and my supervisor was just kinda staring at me the entire time, more or less in utter disbelief. Eventually once I hit the magical number of 150 fucking pairs of shoes my register starts screaming at me to stop and I have to check him out and do the rest in another transaction. Dude swipes his card and the Credit Card company fucks the entire thing and makes my manager call them to approve this dude buying $1600 goddamn dollars worth of shoes, which naturally took 30 minutes of awkward silence and them hanging up twice.

Then I had to check out another $800 worth of shoes and it actually worked this time. Of course since it's Kmart and we have that dumbass 'Shop Your Way' points nonsense he didn't have an account so I just put in one of my dummy accounts I use to maintain my quota (and occasionally get free shit) and immediately went to the bathroom to cry. I went back to pull my register since I was already 20 minutes late and I casually check the account and as it turns the whole fiasco gave me $200 worth of Kmart money to spend on whatever the hell I want. For once, these stories actually had a happy ending sort of.

If I see that guy again though I'm shutting my fucking light off and running.

 

[lolwut]

Oh boy I got a pretty fantastic story from a whopping 2 days ago. A little background (in case you didn't read a couple of my other posts), I work at a K-mart as a cashier and it sucks. Anyways I had the closest thing to a night shift you get (like 2:30-10pm) and it was about 45 minutes before the store closes and I'm tired as fuck since I want to just pass out since I didn't get any sleep last night because my brain hates me.

Anyways I'm just checking some lady out and behind her I see some short mexican guy who looks like some obligatory cartel dude who you have to blow up at some dockside warehouse in every GTA game ever made, with 2 entire fucking carriages literally filled to the fucking brim with shoes. Like no boxes, just shoes. As it turns out we've been having a 'buy one get another for $1' promotion for shoes and I guess this guy owned like a flea market table or something and felt like flipping every fucking shoe in the store.

Shit was awkward since the dude didn't speak english and was constantly muttering shit in spanish and my supervisor was just kinda staring at me the entire time, more or less in utter disbelief. Eventually once I hit the magical number of 150 fucking pairs of shoes my register starts screaming at me to stop and I have to check him out and do the rest in another transaction. Dude swipes his card and the Credit Card company fucks the entire thing and makes my manager call them to approve this dude buying $1600 goddamn dollars worth of shoes, which naturally took 30 minutes of awkward silence and them hanging up twice.

Then I had to check out another $800 worth of shoes and it actually worked this time. Of course since it's Kmart and we have that dumbass 'Shop Your Way' points nonsense he didn't have an account so I just put in one of my dummy accounts I use to maintain my quota (and occasionally get free shit) and immediately went to the bathroom to cry. I went back to pull my register since I was already 20 minutes late and I casually check the account and as it turns the whole fiasco gave me $200 worth of Kmart money to spend on whatever the hell I want. For once, these stories actually had a happy ending sort of.

If I see that guy again though I'm shutting my fucking light off and running.

That explains how so many fucking shoes keep ending up on power lines around here.