After opening yesterday, you got a chance to sleep in this morning and not come in to work until 3 pm; what luxury?!?  As soon as you get to work, you hear your front cashier cannot come in tonight because she fell getting off the bed this morning.  In the back of your mind you are thinking, I have done MUCH worse when it involves getting off and a bed, but I can still make it to work every single day; not one call out in three years because it’s not allowed for MANAGEMENT to call out!  You remember the time you came to work and spent several hours with “John” in the not-so-sanitary restroom while still getting “refund” and “change” pages.  Ah, the good times!

After you have completed your management duties you stroll back to the not-so-sanitary restroom and you notice a horrific stench as you approach the restrooms.  “Great!  Just what I wanted to deal with as soon as I get to work!”  As you get closer to the mens room you realize the odor is coming from the ladies room.  You proceed to ask one of your female employees to please check it out.  The look on her face as she is exiting the ladies room explains it all.  You inform her that it is her day to clean the restrooms and ask her to clean it up.  Super bitch immediately takes over this once normal person and you hear something to the effect of “I ain’t doing that shit, ya’ll don’t pay me enough to clean up after nasty women.”  Oh boy, here we go.  Well, one thing is for certain, you definitely got your Masters Degree to clean up shit; literally!

After spending the time to unclug the ladies restroom you are now completely disgusted and it is only 4:00 pm.  You ask the previous manager when they are leaving and they explain that they are out the door right now.  Awesome!  Another shift of getting NO meals; just what the doctor ordered.  About this time you hear “manager to the front for customer assistance.”  You know this is a disaster waiting to happen.  As you approach the front of the store you see the #1 coupon whore in the world.  The same women has returned at least 20 items without a receipt and expects cash back every time.  Most of the time these items are purchased entirely with coupons so she basically makes money.

You notice that her three foot long receipt is full of hieroglypics and other ancient Egyptian markings that only she can decipher.  You see what looks like a bird drawn sideways beside an upside down ax; a circle with three dots and a squiggly line in it streams down the side of the receipt.  As she shows it to you she explains that the two items should have been 2 for $3.00.  The receipt, amidst the hieroglyphics, clearly shows the same item rung up twice for $1.31 and $1.69.  You pull out your trusty calculator and explain to her that 1.31 plus 1.69 is 3.  She is absolutely baffled.  “That ain’t right!  You did something to the calculator!”  Of course I did; I set my handy, piece of shit, two dollar calculator to read 3 for every addition problem.

She goes on and on about how you are being disrespectful and you should explain it better and easier for her to understand.  “Sorry lady, I know it takes a PhD. in Mathematics to understand 1.31 plus 1.69 is 3.”  Eventually she leaves, but you know you will see her again the next day with another receipt.  At this point you are completely fed up and it is only 4:45.  You go back into the office and check the “store notes” for the day.  The number one concern is to pull the paper goods bay.  HELL YES!  I am so glad I got my college degree; there is NO WAY I could have put the Charmin in the right spot had I not taken that graduate level statistics class.  Maybe while I stock the shelves I can find the correlation coefficient between the strength of Brawny and Bounty.  One thing I did learn working in retail management is that I now know the different options to wipe my ass!

After completing the mental challenge of filling toilet paper and paper towels, you decide its time for a bite to eat at 6:00 pm.  You know not to microwave your meal from your previous experiences.  You only have approximately 2 minutes and 16 seconds to eat a meal so you can’t waste that precious time using the microwave.  As you sit down to take a bite of your sandwich an employee walks in and explains that a customer needs some assistance that will take the use of a ladder.  Honestly, this is when you know that retail is for you!  You get your happy ass up and bring a ladder out to the sales floor.  You gladly get the item down to be told “oh, this isn’t want I want.”  You shake your head and just go back to your meal.  You don’t even care about the damn ladder being in the middle of the sales floor.  Maybe one of your employees will have the initiative to put it away for you; yeah, right!

You actually get to finish the entire sandwich before your next task of making signs for displays.  Sometimes you just want to make a sign that says “What the hell does it matter?  You either want to buy it or you don’t!”  Unfortunately you’d get fired for that so you come up with some catchy saying like “Beat the heat and check out our coolers on aisle 16.”  After making about 10 ridiculous signs you put them up and realize that it is time to start “facing the store.”

Once again, you realize there is no possible way you could pull the Snickers to the front of the shelf without having completed that thesis you wrote in graduate school.  After walking around the store and pulling merchandise forward for over an hour, you decide that this just isn’t going to work.  The most challenging activity you had to do all day was to survive super bitch and coupon whore; something you shouldn’t even have to deal with.

As you start counting down the registers you see the subcontracted out floor crew come in the door.  You mention that it is fine to start early because you’d like to get home before 11 pm because you have to be back by 8 am the next day.  As you are counting money one of the supervisors of the cleaning company comes in and throws a fit explaining that the crew cannot start until 9:45.  He asks if you told them that they could start early.  You smile and say, “why yes I did!”  About ten minutes later you get a call from the owner of the cleaning company and he tries to belittle you as much as possible by saying “I’ll make sure to call your boss and tell him that you said they could do that; what was your name again?”  You gladly tell him your name and finish the conversation with the fact that you really don’t care if he calls your boss because you’ve had enough.

After that conversation, you get the luxury of sitting around until 11:00 pm at night while the floor crew mops, sweeps and buffs the floor; something that could have been done an hour ago!  As you sit on the counter in the front of the store, you realize that after a 30 minute drive home, time to unwind, take a shower and get a quick bite to eat, there is NO WAY you will be in bed before midnight.  This means you might get six hours of sleep if you are lucky.  Something finally triggers in the back of your mind that THIS IS IT!  They are not going to use and abuse you anymore; they can find someone else to do this shit! As you walk out for the final time, you notice the ladder still on the sales floor; not a surprise.

Once again, the sad part about this entire story is that it is completely true and just another day in retail.  I hope those of you who have been used and abused long enough realize that there is much better out there for you.  I promise you that there is no amount of money that can compensate for the loss of relationships between friends and family because your corporation doesn’t give a shit about you.  Luckily for me, I got out while I could, I hope you can do that same!

You get to work at 7:30 knowing that you want everything ready for the store to be open at 8.  You get all the registers ready and check some quick emails before you realize it is 7:58 and none of your employees have shown up.  You make your way to the front of the store and open the doors and stand at the front register with a smile on your face.  You have every desire to write the employees up for being late, but you know your boss will allow them to use some excuse.  Ah, the luxuries of working with uneducated and unmotivated employees.

As you are waiting for your front cashier to come in a customer walks in and wants something from another department.  Obviously you are the only one in the store so you are unable to help them in that department.  The customer looks at you in disgust and says they will go somewhere else.  In the back of your mind you are thinking “please do!” but something very different comes out of your mouth; “Ma’am I will be more than happy to assist you when my front cashier gets here; she should be here any minute.”

Finally, at 8:07 your front cashier walks in and mumbles some type of apology.  She is in no rush to come relieve you as she slowly makes her way to the time clock.  As you make your way to help the waiting customer you hear “Management to receiving.”  At this point you realize how much you love your job.  While giving the best customer service you can to that customer, you have two other customers ask you to help them find something.  All of this could have been solved by having employees that could get to work on time.

At 8:20 you finally get back to receiving.  Luckily it is the Pepsi Vendor who you are good friends with.  You are thinking you finally have a minute to relax and shoot the shit with a friend when you hear, “return at register 1.”  You make your way to register one and the customer explains to you that the .25 coupon was not rung up correctly.  Unfortunately, your corporation has made it impossible to do a refund without canceling out the entire transaction.  You explain this to the customer and she asks “isn’t there an easier way?”  Yes, there is; take the quarter and stick it up your ass!  Instead, you ring up all 22 items she bought again and make sure to ring up the .25 coupon at the end.  It takes ten minutes for her to save .25, but I am sure it was worth it.

You then realize that you left the Pepsi vendor in the back and you need to let him out.  As he is leaving you both joke around about how great your jobs are.  At this point it is now 9:00 and you have yet to do any of your morning management duties.  As you go back to the office a customer asks you where the Depends are.  You gladly show him that they are approximately six feet from his face!  While doing some work in the office, your boss mentions that you need to get some of the inventory out of the stockroom.  YES!

As you are filling up your cart with Campbells Tomato Soup and Hunts Tomato Sauce you are asking yourself “where did I go wrong?”  I KNEW I should not have skipped that Managerial Accounting class my junior year!  After you have your pyshcological battle you continue forward and stock merchandise on the shelves.  After doing this for several hours you decide it is lunch time.

After heating your meal in the microwave, you sit down and take a bite to eat when you hear “management needed at the front register.”  Well, this should be quick and then I can come back and finish my meal.  On your way to the front register, another customer asks you where the twin pack erasers are that are on sale.  You are extremely nice and walk her to the stationery aisle when you hear “management needed at the front register.”  When you look at the front register you see three extremely upset customers.

As you try to fix this situation, an employee is asking you if he can go to lunch.  You really don’t give a shit what he does at this point, you just want to get these customers out the door.  The same damn coupon situation that happened this morning happened again but now there is a line of people.  You go through the same exact process that takes about 10 minutes.  It has now been 15 minutes since you took your first and only bite of lunch.  After FINALLY getting all the customers out the door, you return to your lunch 20 minutes later.  When you sit down and take bite number 2, you hear “management to receiving.”  It doesn’t get any better than this!

At this point, you pick up your lunch and throw it in the trashcan.  “I am fed up with this, why the hell can’t my boss get some of these calls?!?”  You return to receiving and the warehouse truck is there ready for you to unload 400 pieces of inventory.  As you are unloading the truck, you get a phone call.  An employee is explaining to you that she cannot come in tonight because her brother’s ex-girlfriend has a flat tire two states away.  You explain to her that this is not an excuse and she proceeds to tell you she is already two states away.  At this point, you just want to get the truck finished, so you make a mental note and say fine.

After the truck is completely unloaded, two hours later, you try to get a full meal in.  You actually get to sit down for 10 minutes and enjoy your one full meal of the day.  After you finish eating, around 3:00, your boss mentions that the entire truck needs to be put up today.  Once again you are thinking, why the hell did I go to college to put up baby diapers?  You keep your mouth shut and press on.  For the next two hours you put up tote after tote and at one point you are tempted to just walk out.  You don’t though as you know you have bills to pay and you can’t just quit your job, right?

At around 4:45, you start to clean up when you notice two kids on the toy aisle destroying absolutely everything while their mother is on her cell phone.  As your boss walks by, he mentions that the aisle needs to be cleaned up before you leave.  As you are cleaning it up, the kids continue to play with the toys and sit on the whoopie cushions.  Finally, at 5:15 the mother tells the kids that they need to go.  It takes you another 30 minutes to clean up the aisle after the disaster.

At 6:00, you finally get the chance to go home.  You are extremely hungry as you have only had one meal and you are physically dead because you unloaded AND put up a warehouse truck.  One of your old friends calls and asks you to go out tomorrow night.  Luckily for you, you get to close the store tomorrow night so you apologize and say you will make sure to go out with them soon.  In the back of your mind, you know that you will rarely get a chance to see your friends as the schedule is horrible.

As you drive home you think that it might be time to quit, the sad part is that you realize today wasn’t even that bad of a day; Christmas is going to be 10 times worse!  For anyone who has worked in retail management, you know EXACTLY how I feel.  Luckily for me, I QUIT!