This article is based on the AskReddit question "Redditors who worked in retail what has to be the most "Are you serious" moment ever?"
[Source can be found at the end of the article.]
1/15. I worked at Walmart. A woman came in to return a bag of soil because "the bag was dirty". She was dead serious.
-imfinethough
2/15. I used to work in H&M located on 5th ave in NYC. One day I hear over our radio a frantic call for the porter to come to the ladies fitting room. Turns out a woman decided to defecate in the fitting room, and use some shirts to wipe herself.
The real are you serious moment was that she continued shopping through the store casually.
-mkaj91
3/15. Watched a man carrying six bottles of red wine simply drop all six bottles on the ground (shattering them) and walk out of the store, khakis stained bright red like a savage business casual warlord.
My assumption was that it was an accident and he was horribly embarrassed and just left. I'd like to believe that it was an intentional piece of performance art, because it was the most beautiful thing I have ever witnessed.
-lawlessSyntax
4/15. I worked at a bakery counter in a grocery store. Lady asks me about a cake that has fresh raspberries on top, I tell her, "It's a white cake, raspberry filling, and fresh raspberries." She thinks about it and then asks, "Does it taste like cherries?"
After looking at her and trying not to say anything rude for a good solid minute, I managed to say no, and I walked away into the back.
-Suddenlypie88
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5/15. I hear "excuse me?" and look up from stocking the milk, which I'm standing in front of. "Could you tell me where your milk is?"
I almost didn't answer her, milk is basically the whole aisle and I had it in my hands.
-zhumblebug
6/15. One time before HDTV and flat TV's but still since cable ready TV's
A lady came into Wal-Mart with a huge floor model console TV, the kind that had no remote, and wanted to return it and get her money back.
She started yelling at me when I told her I wasn't accepting the return as she had no receipt and the TV was obviously over 15yrs old, and she demanded to speak with a manager.
So I paged a manager who told her basically the same thing, she then started demanding to speak with "Sam".
We were like "Sam Who?"
"Sam Walton - Your Boss!" she screams.
My manager had about enough of this lady's BS and told her, "Well ma'am we have a wide selection of shovel in Lawn & Garden so you can go dig him up!
-brunobits
7/15. Not retail but I worked at McDonald's when I was 16-17. My first day, in the grill area training during lunch rush this guy comes in through drive thru and orders 100 burgers, 50 plain, 50 with cheese. I was like, "wtf man?" I was told it was a lunch truck guy that would order them (at the time we had a 49 cent burger and 59 cent cheeseburger day) then dress them out and sell them for like 2 to 3 bucks a piece to his customers.
-Beantownfan73
8/15. A guy came in who I have never encountered in my life, served him and all was well. 3 hours after my shift, a notification pops up on my phone. This guy had found my Instagram and my Snapchat and added me. What's creepy is the only thing he knew about me was my first name. That was it. Also, I only recently moved to the area and know nobody here. Creeped me out for sure.
-bilboslaggins_
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9/15. I work at Macy's in the women's shoes department. Our customer base mainly buys clearance items, and rarely spends more than $40. Everyday I watch as customer after customer asks if they can use coupons, get an extra % off of the price or any discount possible. Now, one customer took the cake over every other one. She came to me and asked for the mate to 18 clearance shoes. As I work off commission and this was a pretty large sale, I basically ran around the stockroom to gather these shoes. I brought them all out neatly stacked in their boxes, and rang them up at the register for her and her total came to $236.
This is where things went south. She asked if she could use her 20% off coupon, now normally hell yeah you can use that coupon, but in this day we were having a sale. All clearance shoes were marked down 80% and were roughly $10-20 per pair. So coupons were prohibited. She then SCREAMED at me until I called my manager. Like calling me every name in the book, telling me I'm an idiot, that I shouldn't be allowed to work there because I must be dumb, everything. My manager finally came and when she explained that coupons weren't allowed for this particular sale, the woman bought all 18 pairs, for $236, but made someone else ring it up so I wouldn't make commission on the sale. Little did she know the other sales person rang it up using my ID number.
-AlphaTadpole
10/15. I used to work at a grocery store as a bagger. This guy said he wanted his milk in a bag, and he has a lot of stuff... so when I finally got around to the milk (cause prioritizing and all that jazz), I wanted to confirm that's what he said. It just slipped my mind. So I asked again...
He proceeded to yell, so loud that the next two lanes got quiet and they were all staring at what was going on, "Are you stupid? You have hearing problems? Where is your manager? They should fire you for being so stupid. I already said I wanted it in the bag."
I just want to make people happy. Of course, the manager was working that day, so he didn't say a word, even though he watched it go down. I at least had the sympathy of the checkers from the other two lanes.
-echoviolet
11/15. I work in produce. Someone came into the produce section and starting complaining to me that we didn't have milk on display. In the produce section.
We ended up calling someone from grocery and he came back and said she complained the entire walk over to the dairy section, and when she got there she ended up not buying any milk because "it isn't fresh enough.
-wRIPPERw_
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12/15. Worked at a Target and have literally a thousand stories, but the one that sticks out to me was one I wasn't actually present for. Gentleman walked in one day with a blender, sat down in our Starbucks, and proceeded to make himself a smoothie. I can't emphasize enough that this is retail, this is hardly the weirdest thing that's ever happened to us. The floor leader on duty ask if he needs anything, is looking for anything, he smiles and says no, thank you, very polite. When he's finished, he takes the blender, goes into the bathroom, and proceeds to pour the smoothie onto his head and begin to shave. In a Target bathroom, which admittedly, are already a little akin to the Twilight Zone. Anyway, a male employee was sent in to ask what exactly he was doing, and apparently, the man replied with "What? It's not like I'm doing anything illegal? What're you going to do, call the cops?"
Yes, apparently. I guess several other male employees were called up to guard the door before anyone else could get in before police arrived. Don't know exactly what happened to the guy, but I'm glad he's getting use out of his blender.
-rogerdavist
13/15. Woman bought a shed. I asked her her loading bay number and she said she hadn't driven. Asked her if she needed the number of a man with a van or something. She said her husband could carry it.
I stared at her and said very slowly "Madam, it is a building."
She insisted that I was being ridiculous and demanded we bring it up so her middle age, slightly chubby husband could carry it out the store as they only lived "about ten minutes walk away".
We brought it up, with extreme difficulty, and she asked me "what's that thing?" I said "That's your shed madam." "There's no way Jeff is carrying THAT!"
Oddly she decided to pay the money to have it delivered.
-reverendmalerik
14/15. I worked at Suncoast (video retailer) during the early 2000s and some dude kept calling me for weeks asking me if the movie "Churro Man" had come out on DVD. He had a pretty thick Hispanic accent to his English. I considered myself a film buff and I had never heard of a movie called Churro Man. Every time he called I would look up "Churro Man" in the computer database and of course nothing would come out. I would ask him if he got the title wrong, perhaps it was "The Wicker Man" and he was like "Nah dude, it's Churro Man, I saw a commercial that it was coming out on DVD." It got to the point where I just thought the guy was messing with me.
One day the guy came into the store in person. He came up to the register and was like "You guys finally got it huh?" While holding up a DVD, it was True Romance.
-ZMBGiEF
15/15. Worked in a local fruit market as a teenager.
Packed this lady's grocery bag and went to put it in her shopping trolley when she started screaming at me about what a horrible young girl I was and don't I have any compassion etc etc.
Turns out she had her pet rabbit sitting in the bottom of the trolley (wrapped in a fur coat no less). I was "trying to crush it to death" by being nice and loading up her groceries for her.
I ended up crying while the next lady in line consoled me.
-CourrtyCub
(Source)
Real life contains the scariest horrors you could ask for. So aren't we all living in a horror movie, in a way? At least, these people sure freakin' were.
MisterSnowman69 asked: What was a moment in your life that felt like a horror movie scene?
In the words of the legendary Mary Vivian Pierce in the film Pink Flamingos, “Murder merely relieves tension”. I’m sure the following Redditors felt differently.
Nothing scarier than the woods at night.
Went into a real deep woods hike for only the second time in my life.
My gps broke and had to rely on my compass. Got turned around a few times because I couldn't remember the direction I came from, and it was getting dark. Lost the trail way.
But the woods are weirdly silent in the dark and alone.
It was around 2am by the time I found the trailhead.
Darn foxes.
the simpsons react GIFGiphyMy friend and I got lost late on one foggy night in the Italian countryside. There were rats all over and every once in a while we heard someone scream.
I've never been more sure I was about to get murdered than I was that night.
It was probably a red fox that was screaming.
Could've also been a lynx, but they are much rarer in Italy.
At least she wasn’t speaking in tongues.
My mom is quite the sleep talker, but it's usually pretty short and incoherent when it happens. One night as a teenager, I woke up to her scream-yelling the Hail Mary prayer (my bedroom was across the house and upstairs).
Difficult to get back to sleep after that one.
Sometimes scary sh*t ends up just being funny coincidences. Super funny. Right?
Don’t give them any ideas.
I was exploring an abandoned mental asylum and then got the scare of my life when a scary looking person inside one of the rooms was just staring at me without moving. Turns out some joker had left a cardboard cutout there.
And now I have plans this weekend... Just need to find a couple of cardboard cutouts and to break into the local abandoned asylum.
Don’t you hate when that happens?
Evil Dead Horror GIF by Coolidge Corner TheatreGiphyI was driving home on backcountry roads at midnight in heavy fog. Like can't see 10 feet in front of you thick. Suddenly I see an all-white silhouette running in front of the car. Every hair on my body stood up. I immediately think "oh god, oh f*ck, it's a f*cking woman in white, I'm gonna f*cking die"
Nope just a drunk who dove into the ditch.
Gotta love paranoia.
When I was about 12, my parents went out for dinner leaving me home alone. We lived out in the country, on a private road with only three other houses, surrounded by cow fields and wooded areas.
I went into the the kitchen and glanced out the window towards the trees and there in the fading light I could see a person walking slowly through the woods. They were wearing all black, moving slowly and appeared to pause behind trees. My heart started pounding so hard in my ears I couldn't hear anything else and I was weak and shaky from fear. I froze and just watched them. Would they come to the house? Where were they going?
This was before cell phones but I suddenly remembered my mom had left the number of the restaurant by the living room phone. Slowly, I made my way towards the living room, trying to watch this stranger in the woods.
Just as I entered the living room, all the lights in the entire house went out. By this time it was nearly dark outside. I started openly sobbing and in the dark I heard a weird boom like noise. That was it, I ran to my parents room, hid under their bed and sobbed. That's where my mom found me hours later (it felt like).
Well, turns out the stranger in the woods was a stupid cow that had busted through a fence, the lights going out was from an accident a few miles away (hit the power line) and the boom was the pilot light in the gas stove. Man, I have never been that scared in my life though!
I have a lot of questions.
A naked man who was covered in blood chased me across a park at 2 in the morning. I was totally alone. He just wanted money for a bus (????) and luckily nothing bad happened but I thought I was going to die.
But of course, the genuine horrors do exist. And they aren’t scary in a fun horror movie way, they’re actually terrifying because they can happen to anyone.
A scary few seconds.
car chase GIF by Mayans M.C.GiphyI am a "baby" in a car seat in between cousins in backseat. Dad is driving. This is in the 80s and it is my aunt's insistence that I am in this seat even though I am like 5.
A sleeping semi driver is coming over into our lane and there is a cliff on other side. Basically my dad did some amazing driving but semi blew us up. I am uninjured sitting in the seat swinging my legs while everyone is unconscious. They all wake groaning. Dad doesnt wake up.
Long story short just minor scrapes and dad has broken leg. But the crunch of metal and those few seconds/minute of being the only "alive" person was quite fear inducing.
Glad they’re all ok now.
Two days after my now boyfriend told me he liked me he fell from a zip line and broke his back. Almost died. 6 months later he got into a car wreck from a drunk driver - almost died. 6 months after that, he passed out and had to have emergency brain surgery, again, almost died. I now have severe anxiety/separation anxiety/and ptsd. That whole year was a f*cking nightmare
Edit: we're both okay now, the brain injury was almost a year ago. But TBIs take a while to heal so he still has side effects. Thankfully our relationship is still strong; he's physically getting better and I'm healing emotionally too. Lucky for him, the trauma of the injuries has caused him to forget the majority of the pain and memories of those incidents.
ALWAYS wear a helmet.
Driving home from work at 23, listening to my favorite song.
I pull up to a red light, and see this guy on a motorcycle coming up next to me in the other lane. I rolled down my window to compliment his bike when he stops. He doesn't, and runs the red light. He hits a car going at least 55mph. His motorcycle shatters apart, he goes flying, hits the hood of another car, and lands on the ground and rolls into the curb (no helmet). The car he hit with his motorcycle was totaled. I had to step over his body to talk to the police. He was still alive when they got there. I regret not holding his hand. It was just a normal day, and all of a sudden it felt like the rug was pulled from out beneath me. He was only 18.
Edit: The song was Sunny by Boney M., for those curious
What did we learn today, kids? Foxes scream like humans, shadowy figures are usually cows or drunken rednecks, and once again, PLEASE WEAR A HELMET WHEN YOU RIDE ANY KIND OF BIKE.
Scary sh*t surrounds us. But where there is horror, there are heroes. So next time you think you see a scary figure in the woods, know that Bruce Campbell is probably right around the corner
Hypocrisy is everywhere; it's like a disease. And sadly everyone does it. Some of us indulge in smaller doses than others. But some people live their life by it. Like how can you support civil servants, like police, firefighters, etc... yet try to find ways to hide money in order to not pay taxes? Tell me... I'll wait.
Manga...
Hungry Night Court GIF by LaffGiphyItalian moms that say you're too fat then say I'm making grandma cry by not finishing my pasta.
Asian moms too! Not only that if you try to not eat, they make to go containers for you. Oh, sorry I have to leave, RUNS AT LEAST HAVE SOME FRUIT.
Phonies...
Celebrities positioning themselves as champions for social justice while launching a clothing line with no comment on the labor conditions their garments are made in.
Sexy Times...
The Porn Industry
Why is prostitution considered a crime, but it becomes perfectly legal once a camera is put beside them?
I think the first amendment helps with that one. There's been many a supreme-court case about whether porn is protected speech.
Mirror, Mirror on the Wall...
You can get away with WAY more crap, in general, when you're attractive.
But we all kind of aspire to attractiveness and it's not like it's attractive people's fault, exactly. So what is there to be done?
So true. Money and beauty are treated like virtues and they aren't. They're luck of the draw. It probably helps you to be a better person if people assume that you are gentle and clever just by looking at your face or wallet.
KIDS
GIF by MOODMANGiphyPeople screaming at you if you don't want Kids and Kids are the greatest thing in the World and then turn around and whine how expensive they are and how annoying yadda yadda.
Yeah see... humans are a mess. And too often then not, personal conviction and dignity are just a myth, or a punchline. Double standards have always been a way of life. And many of us have begrudgingly learned to navigate.
Fashion
Fashion Model GIF by NYFW: The ShowsGiphyIf a skinny person wears something out of the ordinary, it's a fashion statement and awesome. It can even just be something like a crop top or overalls.
But God forbid a fat person wear the same thing.
Distractions
The hypocrisy hypocrisy. People love to call it out but rarely notice it on themselves and if they notice it then it's something completely different or a distraction.
That's the worst. I hate that I have to hate that. But if I don't hate it, then the hate will just continue. So, really, my hate comes from my love of an end to hate. So anyone who hates my hate hates love. And we must hate anyone who hates love!
My Morality
My own personal hypocrisy; When I was a lot less well off financially, delivering pizzas trying to get through college, I kept a cup of coins in my car. When a homeless person would approach me for spare change, I gave them the cup. Most of the time it was nearly full, so there was probably 20-30 dollars in there.
Now that I have a good salaried job, even if I've got a few bucks in my wallet, I tend to not even make eye contact anymore. I know it's awful, I know it makes me crappy, but the last 4-5 years have made me a jaded craphead towards people in general. I used to be so hopeful and I wanted to help everyone, and tried to live a life that reflected that.
Now, while my general and political morality is pretty much the same, my personal morality has gotten more grey. I'd jaded, I hate people, I assume the worst of people I used to assume the best of. I don't really care about the strangers around me like I used to, but I still expect everyone else to.
Placing Blame
Victim mentality.
It's so freaking frustrating when it becomes entrenched. "You did this, it's your fault" "you should've known to do x, its your fault" Yeah bro your problems aren't my problems and if all you do is make excuses and blame me for them, it's not going to be my fault when you don't develop as a person and accomplish your dreams. I'm sure they'll find someone to blame though.
In D.C.
Donald Trump Reaction GIF by Election 2016GiphyPoliticians work part time, are given free housing, education, and health care, and exempt from the everyday violence we experience, but refuse to lift a finger to help us.
At this points most people running for a position in the government are only in it for the benefits of being a politician and the amount of money they can embezzle. Well in my country at least.
Just speak a truth and live it. Yes, it maybe hard. But what part of life isn't? Hypocrisy is just lying. Plain and simple. And it's a sin to lie.
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