Working The Retail

I work part-time in a book store. It's a very cool job, and most of the time I love it. Today, however, I dealt with some difficult customers.

One woman stuck her head in the door, said "I'm going to make this quick," then proceeded to suck my brain dry for the next fifteen minutes. She was looking for a particular book, and when I showed it to her (and she discovered it was a series), she began to hem and haw over the price, and which ones to get for her grandchildren, and could they share.

[Note to lady: not only can your grandchildren share, they SHOULD share.]

Then she pointed to one of the books in her hand and said to me "How do you know that's the second book in the series?" I pointed to the number on the spine, and said "The number is on the spine." This kind of thing went on for a while, meaning I repeated information to her about 80 billion times, and then she asked why the latest book in the series didn't have a "#1 New York Times Bestseller" teaser on the cover. I had to explain that it had been released fairly recently, and wouldn't automagically appear on the bestseller list. Except I was much nicer about it, and didn't use the word "automagically."

  *****

After lunch, two women entered the store, and the older one (who couldn't have been much older than I am, but she had straggly blonde hair and dentures, so she looked about 45 or 50) asked where she might find a Christian book store. I said "I'm not sure, since I'm a big old HEATHEN" and flashed a boob at her.

Just kidding, Elisa!

I used Google to find the closest Christian book store and wrote down the name and address. The woman thanked me, and decided to browse. She said "Where's your books with stories in 'em?" After I reattached my head, I showed her the general fiction section. She asked about mysteries, so I showed her the mystery section (right next to regular fiction; the store isn't that big). It was then that I noticed the other woman she was with was pregnant. And she wasn't quite an adult yet. She was a teenager with braces on her teeth and zits on her face.

[Aside: Living in the oasis of Lexington makes me forget I live in a state with some pretty dismal statistics. These women embodied a few stereotypes of Kentuckians. And that's all I'm going to say about that.]

The women (mother and daughter?) browsed for a while. All of a sudden, I heard "Hey, you ain't got none-a them accordiances of the Bahble, do ya?" I beckoned them to the religion section, and showed them the Bibles, and said "If we have a concordance, it would be here." Then I spotted one and pulled it off the shelf. "Here's one." The woman looked at it, and said, "Now where does it say it's an accordiance on there?" My head fell off again — that's twice in ten minutes, people — but I managed to point to the word CONCORDANCE, and said "Right there. It says concordance. That's what you're looking for."

Her daughter (I presume) said "Now you don't have to go to the Christian book store," but mom said "Oh, Ah still do."

  *****

The last customer, also a woman (heyyyy, wait a minute!), was someone I'd been expecting, as she'd called in the morning to ask me to hold several books by two noted Kentucky authors. I gave her the pile of books, and she proceeded to look at them at the counter. Right in front of me. And then she was talking to herself, but she was really talking to me, asking me questions I didn't know the answer to. "Is this appropriate for preschoolers? Oh wait, this author's books have an age range in them. That's great. Oh, I love the illustrations! But I don't know if I can fit this into my lesson plan. How much is this one? [I told her.] And what about this one? [I told her.] I just don't know if this would work with four-year-olds." And I suffered another ten minutes of eye-glazing, mind-numbing dithering. At one point I said "I don't know any of these books, but this one has riddles in it, so that would probably be too much for preschoolers."

And then finally, "So, $16.95 and $16.95, that'll be about thirty dollars?" I said "It'll be more like thirty-five." Silly me, I'd forgotten the sales tax. The total was thirty-seven dollars and two cents. 

                                                            *****

My job rocks, really. I shouldn't complain about it. I suppose I was recounting more than I was complaining — you should read some of my entries of life in Small Town, France*. That's the style I was going for, a humorous retelling of something that made me laugh.

Do you have any funny work stories?

*I really need to go through my archives and categorize more of the older entries.

Comments

[bhd]

You have insulted the word AutoMagically. ATONE!

[Kathryn]

Ah yes, you bring back fond memories of working retail. I worked in a video store for many years and one of my favorite moments was when a man approached the counter, held up the video box, and asked for "Two Thumbs Up." I kid you not.

[coldbear]

Lorsque tu écrivais depuis la France, je comprenais sans effort tes posts. Depuis que tu es au Kentucky, ton anglais est plus difficile. Je crois que cela tiens à l'environnement que je ne connais pas. L'affaire accordiance et concordance, même avec le Harraps, m'échappe ...
Sympa de te lire de nouveau...

[Mari]

One of the best ones I have is when I was working at the H&R Block in downtown Harlan. One of the tax preparers called me back to her cubicle, looked up at me like she was in pure misery, and asked, "Turn me into a toad and stomp on me?" I just stood there slack-jawed and bug-eyed. Then we both died laughing.

And we had little old women who'd call, their voices cracky and shaky, and ask, "Do y'all do taxes?" "Yes, ma'am, we're a tax preparation service."

[melanie]

after being a bartender, a waitress, a hostess, a chef, a shoe salesperson, sold men's suits for a while too which included tailoring... (nothing quite as intellectually stimulating as your position).

my wildest experience out of all my exciting transactions in the retail world was a man who wanted a suit he purchased altered. The pants specifically. He would say measure the seam on the inner thigh... Ok mr. consumer, whatever you say... after the second visit to the store for the same suit.. I had my manager "handle" him.

Retail gives you great material for a blog!!!

[gorillabuns]

What a great job. Maybe I should go work at a local joint. I would really like to open an old style music store but know that in the computer age, people just don't appreciate touching and feeling vinyl and CD's anymore.

[Margaret]

What a fantastic post! I laughed myself silly. I have ridiculous moments in teaching and I need to write more about them!

[Beth]

"Oh, Ah still do."

Does your store carry a book titled Retail Therapy? Is there a book titled thusly? If not, you should write it!

[Scott Beveridge]

When I was a bartender in a former life in a four star restaurant, a man attempting to impress his date asked for a Chateaubriand on the rocks and Goobolay straight up. I smiled and poured them a Chablis and Grand Marnier.