Shoplifter: The New Kids

“Folded clothes will eventually be touched;
But buying customers are here right now.”

I might have been schooled today by young shoplifters who unknowingly played the stealing game better than I. For one, we’re having a big visit tomorrow, so many people were spending time folding–yet, as big managers have said before, “I don’t care if the store looks like a tornado hit, if there are customers, and you make money, I’m happy.” Who cares if you folded the entire store beautifully, if you spent the entire day ignoring customers? Seriously, I was working my butt off today, trying to make money–our store has been having trouble, people have been losing hours, and yet the people who could be helping coworkers earn more hours are just standing around folding.

This struck a huge chord once I realized there were shoplifters. One of the new coworkers later said, “Oh, I said hi to them.” AND? No announcement of their arrival? Not a care to keep an eye on them and treat them like customers? Shoplifters and thieves have a hard time stealing if there is actual customer service going on around them. I was amazed when I saw them casually walking in the back of the store with their bags full and they were smiling and having fun. Why? Because no one was around them, at all. I rushed by, because I was helping several customers at one time, and said on the walkie-talkie, “THERE ARE SHOPLIFTERS IN THE STORE! They are obviously enjoying themselves, because their bags are full!” Everyone else sprung to action, because they saw who I saw, and instantly recognized them as shoplifters. As I’ve said, it’s sad when shoplifters look like shoplifters. Even worse, there were four of them!

I tried to finish with my customers, but I was burdened with too many, while trying to keep an eye on these shoplifters–even though I’m not trained to deal with them, I’m expected to deal with them. So I’m searching for a bag to get the price, seeing three coworkers at the cash register as I groan to myself. I walk by the shoplifters swearing, saying I’m looking for a bag–which ironically, I know they picked up one of our bags and filled it with clothes. They started to talk to me, saying, “Whoa, you just swore!” I talked to them about ‘the bag’ and refused to leave the area they were in–it was quite obvious they wanted the clothes in the front of the store.

Eventually, I had to move. No one was helping me deal with them, and I actually had customers waiting for me in the fitting room. This always irritates me to no end. As I turn to walk away, they leave, with the bag. Here, they were in a win-win situation. There was no tag on the outside of the bag–they are inside–so I couldn’t say, “Hey, that’s our bag!” They can just say, “I already bought it!” Nor can I legally look into their bag, even if it beeped when they left–although, it didn’t beep because these bags had no sensors on them, nor did the clothes they stole have sensors. I was in a helpless position, and all I could do was stop them from stealing more clothes. Instead, I grabbed all the bags of the same type and put sensors on them immediately.

I then had to leave for my lunch break. In that time, they actually returned twice–with us communicating to all the other stores nearby that these people are shoplifters. I was amused to hear, they came and tried to steal something, but they beeped at the door. Later, I found they tried to steal another one of my bags, but threw it in a corner when it beeped. At least I saved that bag. It just becomes tiresome when I have to deal with these shoplifters, and work hard to sell to customers, while I have to watch other people walking around ignoring customers, folding, and generally not carrying the weight of their own paychecks. Retail is killing me.

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Dead Fish

So there was a short, wide woman with a cast on her foot. She asked a coworker for a style of pant we no longer carry–which was a flared-style of trouser denim–so my coworker asked me what the most similar style was. So I told her, since I was in a rush and needed to help another customer.

About twenty minutes later, I see the woman, “Hello again,” I say to her. She asks me for the style of pant, once again, and I tell her we no longer make it, but I had told my coworker the alternative–to which she said she was never told, later I found out the woman lied to me. Well, the alternate style was in front of us, and I showed it to her. She started by complaining it was distressed. I told her these wide styles of pant are more casual and thus come looking like this–all of those similar styles do–some people call them Boyfriend pants or jeans because they are symbolized by the fact they are made to look like men’s jeans, and worn-in like men’s jeans, “It’s like slipping into your boyfriend’s jeans.”

She remained resolute, not wanting anything that looks like that, and I told her we don’t have other options. This is where she started, “Why did you stop making that style? Why don’t you carry it anymore? I liked that style. A lot of women are built like me and it works for us. I can’t understand why you’d do this to us!”

Firstly, I have no patience for customers that blame me and speak to me as if I am the fault and the reason, that I chose that style to kill off or alter so she can’t wear it anymore. Secondly, there is a truth to the fact–when a style dies off, there is a reason. At this point, I had nothing left to say, because such customers are only here to complain. Don’t kill the messenger, lady.

Twenty minutes later, a coworker asked what I did to that woman, because she’s asking to speak to a manager. During this conversation, she complained that I wasn’t ‘energetic’ and ‘enthusiastic’ when I was helping her–that I didn’t even try to help her find anything. (Lie #2). Thus, she compared me to a dead fish. How can one be enthusiastic with a woman that only complains and blames me for company choices? A woman whose narrow-minded views remind me of a one-lane road built for four-lanes of traffic. A woman who most likely lives in a world where nothing goes her way, mostly because she helps to create the situations where nothing goes right. She wants to always be seen as the ‘help-me’ person and the ‘I really did try’, even though she didn’t try at all. Then she complained about our cashiers, using pantomime and acting to portray them as ‘robotic’–acting out like our cashiers, for the manager to see.

Truthfully, upon hearing this, I wanted to find this woman and tell her, “I know you don’t have any sense to listen to what I have to say, but I’m going to say it, so shut up. That style that you liked, I know it was popular, it was one of our better sellers. I even urged the company to keep it, having contact with one of the executives I told him it was popular, and I even took part in panels and online discussions. I don’t appreciate you blaming me or speaking to me as if it is my fault they stopped making it. I supported it, and it is a true insult that you stand there and speak to me as if I did something wrong. You need to think a little and have a little more respect for things you don’t know or understand.”

Customer Types: Complainer, Don’t Kill the Messenger, Tailor-Made, Liar
(These refer to and will link to a glossary of customer terms, which I’m currently compiling and will update as more customer types emerge.)

P.S.
The fact she has a cast on her leg says a great deal–accidents are either done by you or to you. In her case, I’d say it was done to her.

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