THERE IS A HELL! - - - IT IS CALLED RETAIL CUSTOMERS DON'T REALLY UNDERSTAND RETAIL WORKERS

Customers don’t Really Understand Retail Workers could spout about what Chinon would go best with that dish, I had to hear what dish they were going to serve. Long before I could go on about what they should buy for the wedding reception, I had to know how many people were there and, more importantly, what their preferences were. And so, my co-workers, colleagues or associates I implore you to recognize the world we’re living in; to recognize that the consumer will always be right forever. I implore you, if you’ve never worked retail, to try and find a situation that allows you to do that. I implore college students to highly consider taking a summer job stocking shelves or working a register. The soft skills (which are, in my opinion, hard skills) that you will learn in that job will be transferable to everything you do for the rest of your life. There are a ton of reasons to be kind to the retail workers you encounter on a daily basis, but you’d be surprised how many people are blatantly rude to them. I worked in retail for a few months in various places and I cannot tell you the number of inconsiderate or outright mean customers I had. It was rare that a day would go by where I didn’t have at least one rude customer. I had a lady call me the forbidden “C word” because we were having a Buy One Get One Half off sale but she only wanted one item so insisted she should get it half off and I told her I couldn’t do that. Trust me; I know how hard it is to work retail with an ever present smile on your face while people treat you like you’re barely human. These are a few reasons to be kind to retail workers. So to summarize the problems that bug the Shop Floor Assistant, or Cashier, or Shelf Stacker, or Merchandiser Facing Person, or Warehouse Operator, or even the Shop Floor Cleaner in the Retail Trade (same goes for those poor souls in the Hospitality, Tourist, Service Industry)………………….. THEY EARN LOW PAY FOR LONG HOURS OF WORK One of the best reasons to be kind to retail workers is that they do a lot of work for very little pay. A large majority of retail workers only make minimum wage or just slightly more than that, and if you’ve never worked retail, you’d be incredibly surprised by how much work the job actually entails. A typical day can involve anything from unloading 50 lb boxes from the delivery trucks, taking every item off of shelves and cleaning the rack before replacing the items, sweeping large areas, mopping (usually several times), standing for 8 to 12 hour shifts and let me tell you, they don’t always get breaks. They have to clean up spills and messes that customers create, and if you work in a clothing store, the task of reorganizing and refolding clothing after customers have trashed the shelves or racks is never-ending. During various holiday seasons the long hours and exhausting work are almost unbearable. dodie ste®eo p®odu©tion ™ Page 5 of 9

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