I work at Price Chopper. It's a low-end grocery store akin to No Frills or Food Basics, the difference being that (at least at our location) it's clean. You won't find cockroaches trundling across our produce.
Now, our store is located in an upper-middle class area. We don't see any difference in volume on "welfare Wednesday". I've heard horror stories about customers in Toronto-area Price Choppers who throw vegetables around the store, who try to haggle with everyone for everything, and who have actually been caught on camera dropping, say, a cherry on the floor and then repeatedly trying to trip over it so they can sue.
I saw enough of that kind of behaviour at 7-Eleven to last me several lifetimes, thank you very much. Luckily, we don't get that kind of customer in our store very often.
I have, however, accrued some stories over my three plus years as a Dairy/Frozen Foods manager. Looking back, you laugh. Or cry. Or snarl.
Two things you ought to know about me, first, before I launch into these tales: One, my customer service skills have been nationally recognized. Two: Nearly every day, somebody does or says something that makes me want to (a) give their head a brisk shake or (b) cordially invite them to engage in repeated acts of self-intercourse. With tools.
On my very first day, a woman returned a 2-liter carton of milk, saying that it was leaking. I clapped a mental hand over the mental mouth of my own personal mental sarcastic bastard--hereinafter referred to as MSB--who was trying to mutter something like "how did you not notice this leaking carton of milk somewhere between the counter and the cash, or the cash and your car, or the car and your house, or..." and helpfully scooted back to my milk counter for a replacement. Upon its presentation, the women asked me "Is this one leaking too?"
MSB: Yeah, lady, I carved a big hole in the bottom of this one just for you. Go away.
At least twice a week, somebody asks me where the carts are. I helpfully point out the line of carts outside the store, which, by the way, is usually something like a hundred feet long, while MSB is wondering if this idiot actually *drove* here with eyesight that bad.
Yesterday: "Do you sell bread?"
Now, I had to actually clap *duct tape* over MSB's potty mouth for this gentleman. It was an effort, let me tell you. "Yes, sir, the bread is next to the bakery in the back-left-hand corner of the store." MSB: "Mmmmphs mrmmd? Mmm phryy..."*rrrrrrippp!--he's gone now, what was that? "What's bread? I'm sorry, I've never heard of that product. Try the hardware store down the street."
Then there's the people--and they are legion--who rant and rave about our store's policy on grocery bags. Five cents is what we charge per bag, and you'd think it was fifty dollars, the way people carry on.
Now look. This is MSB talking, but listen to me anyway. You can go to a Loblaws (or a Sobeys if you're really desperate) and pay an extra thirty or forty dollars for the exact same groceries. Or you can pay fifty cents for ten bags and shut the hell up. Your pick.
Likewise: "This is ten cents cheaper at Basics!" "I'm sorry, ma'am, we simply can't be cheaper than everyone on every item all the time." (So go spend fifty cents in gas--not to mention half an hour of your time--to save a dime at Basics, okay?)
And let me tell you something that MSB and I are in total agreement on. If I *ever* actually catch somebody putting fresh pork behind the mushroom soup, or ice cream on the bread rack, or any such thing, I will personally drop them in our cardboard baler and flatten their ass. You never actually see it happen, but every morning, there it is: a bag of milk in with the frozen vegetables, or thawed vegetables in a milk crate. Aside from the asininity (is that a word? It is now) and the astonishing level of laziness, what really gets me is the logic chain. "Okay, I'm shopping, I'm shopping, hmmm, I don't really want these frozen popsicles, I'd rather have this lettuce!" CLUNK! There, fuckwad, you've ruined the popsicles *and* a bunch of lettuce. And I'm sure you're *just* the sort of dinkus who complains loudly whenever prices go up to cover the absolutely ridiculous amount of product that gets thrown out because of people just like you.
What I *really* want to do is go home with these pustules and randomly scatter the contents of their freezers throughout their houses...under the bed, under the couch cushions, oh, wherever I felt like it. Then maybe they'd get the point.
Okay, summoning up every ounce of self-restraint I have, folks, if you're ever in a grocery store and you decide that you don't really want something--particularly a perishable something--please, please, PLEASE bring it to any employee you happen to pass--including a cashier--and s/he'll thank you gratefully and sincerely, and then put it away. Okay? Please.
We used to have a regular we dubbed "Discount Dan". His trick was to rip coupons off reduced merchandise and affix them to whatever he felt like paying less for each day. You can actually be arrested and charged with fraud for doing that. After several weeks of it, I decided to fall back on 7-Eleven training. I shadowed Dan. Closely. Like two paces behind him. Through six aisles.
Haven't seen him since.
There's a woman I see every week, though, and while MSB had a field day with her at one time, I've come to respect her and feel quite sorry for her, too.
She spends--I shit you not--three or four *hours* every week buying her groceries. Every week. Each individual item must be absolutely perfect. She can detect cracks in eggs that you can't see with an electron microscope. Her eyes detect individual dust *molecules*. And by now I'm positive she can recite prices for every item in the store, because she's forever trying to find price discrepancies. I can't begin to tell you how annoying it used to be, to have her constantly interrupting whatever I was doing to ask if I had any milk with a shelf life longer than six weeks, or if I could please find some Omega-3 eggs that *weren't* cracked, or if I could please dance on the pin of her head.
I'm very ashamed to admit it took me a couple of months to understand that this woman--who really is very courteous and friendly--has a mental illness. Obsessive-compulsive disorder. (She's since confirmed it, to me and as far as I know, me alone.) I make an effort now to talk to her whenever I see her--partly as penance for all the bullshit that MSB used to spew silently. And you know what? Although it still takes her an hour to get through my department, she hardly ever asks me anything any more.
So ends this dispatch from the dairy aisle. Thank you for shopping at Price Chopper, the smart choice. Come again soon.
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