Tomorrow is black Friday and that means tons of shoppers and long, long lines. The malls will be packed. I don't know why everyone decides to shop the day after Thanksgiving but they all do and I use to work retail so I have lots of experience with "black Friday."
In the past I managed a few AT&T stores and our whole year was based around the Christmas season. In the months of November and December we would sell more than in the rest of the year. This is how most retailers work and make plans to maximize the opportunities in said months.
In all of the years that I worked on Black Friday I recall that most of the people were courteous and patient as the line to buy service or get a new phone was long. I say MOST were, and then there are these people.
The Breastfeeding Lady
She was standing in line with her very cute infant and then bam, I looked back at her and she was exposing her chestal (not a real word) area in preparation of breastfeeding. She made no effort to hide anything and I approached her to offer my office as a private place to feed her child. She refused and claimed her constitutional rights were being violated. I explained that the right to expose ones breasts in public are most certainly not in the constitution and she would have to use my office or leave.
The “Listen to me Guy”
He paced back and forth in line talking loudly on his phone. It is a cell phone store and customers talking on their phone is the norm but this guy would hover around the good looking girls and talk about some big business deal he had going on that was up until the moment another customer snatched the phone and threw it into the parking lot. The guy came in to complain but as this all occurred outside of the store there was nothing that I could do.
The Anger Pooper
This guy was so upset at one of my reps that I had to intervene. He was upset that he had gone over his minutes and no one from AT&T called him to warn him that he was over his minutes. I explained that we can't make those types of calls with 12 million customers, and he just asked where the bathroom was. I should have known better, he took a poop in the middle of the bathroom floor.
The “Is This Free” Guy
We would always give away little trinkets during the Holidays. Pens, desktop calenders, mouse pads and thumb drives. We had one guy that would come into the store everyday to see what we were giving away and take whatever was offered. He did this for 45 straight days. He was never rude or abrasive, he was always polite and after he got his free thing he left. The only thing about him that was odd is that he was always outside of the store in the early morning waiting for the store to open.
The “No Shoes” Guy
I see this guy standing in line who is not wearing shoes. It is not that he has no shoes, the problem is that he left his shoes by the front door and is walking around barefoot. I found this to be disturbing on many levels (mostly I just think feet are gross). I asked him to put his shoes on or leave. He left. He just walked down the very cold street holding his shoes under his arm.
All in all the Christmas shopping season was a pretty fun time interspersed with a few crazy people. Be nice to the retail clerks as most of them do have tons of free stuff to give away.
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