The Joy of Retail: 7 memorable moments at my RetailEstablishment

I've worked full time at RetailEstablishment for the last 5 years. I've stayed with it because, frankly, I'm crippled and can't get any better paying, less crazy-making jobs. If I could type and file and lift and carry and such, I don't think I would have lasted this long, but since I can't (and since the government has said, "Screw you," about my disability), I had to stay with retail while getting more hurt and taking out huge loans to get a degree I could use to get a teaching job (in theory).

The following events actually happened at my RetailEstablishment:

• A homeless man ate a customer's food while the customer was at the counter getting some water.
• Someone pooped in an aisle on the second floor.
• A pair of obviously used children's underwear was left at the information desk.
• A man entered the store and began singing, swearing, and eventually screaming at the top of his very healthy lungs like a tornado siren for over a minute in the vestibule.
• A man obviously not in right mind entered the store, threatened customers and employees, and eventually knocked over a huge, heavy display upstairs in rage. There was glass on the display. Luckily, no one was cut.
• A man walked into the men's room, shed his clothes, and laid on the floor.
• A man snuck into the handicapped stall in the ladies' room and peeped under the divider at a customer.

(This list does not include all of the screaming, swearing, threatening repeat offenders caught shoplifting or trying to hustle money from customers.)

I think every United States citizen should have to work a 2 year stint in retail, like the South Korean military or maybe more like the 2 years of service Mormons complete. If this enforced retail experience happened, I'd like to believe that the retail world would be a better place because customers would know how hellish they can make life for retail employees, and they would not want to make the employees' lives more miserable. In gratitude, retail employees would go even more out of their way to serve their customers pleasantly, efficiently, and happily. I believe no one should be allowed to be in management or corporate management without four solid years of this experience. I'm a dreamer, I know.

Norm Feuti is a genius. You should read his Pretending You Care: a Retail Handbook if any of the following apply:

• You work(ed) retail and want to know it's just as crazy elsewhere.
• You are considering working in retail, and you think it sounds like great fun.
  
• You have ever shopped in a retail store where people work.
• You will ever shop in a retail store where people work.
• You've been treated "badly" by a retail employee and want to know what could lead them to do that to you.
• You are in management, and you don't hate your employees and you actually want to make their jobs easier and their lives better, so they can be more efficient and productive and better at their jobs.

The book is hilarious. I hurt myself laughing. More than once. Not only is it full of well-organized lists (such as the kinds of employees you'll work with and the kinds of customers you'll interact with), it's also full of Feuti's syndicated comic strip "Retail." It's spot on. I'd say about 85% of this book is common to every retail establishment in the U.S. I'm glad the other 15% doesn't apply to my store. Who wouldn't want a glamorous life in retail? (For the record, we don't have a rooftop place like Cooper. Sigh.)

Anyone have any of your own stories to share?