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[Dreavus]

I worked part time in retail throughout uni. Luckily the place I was at was very flexible with the schedule, had pretty decent management (who actually did got down and did the work in their departments), and also had ample opportunity to slack off a bit to stay sane - Our department had it's own service desk directly attached to the warehouse so we could goof off back there from time to time. However, I went up to full time for a bit near the end of my run and it was starting to get to me even with all those "positives".

It has given me a good dose of empathy and almost infinite patience when dealing with reps at any other store now, because of all the shit I had to deal with. I don't want to inflict that on other people. It always shocks me when I see others treating retail people like absolute crap.

 

[Gabriel_Logan]

So many sheltered people in this thread acting like a retail job is the worst thing that can happen to a person.

Retail work isn't fun but there are waaay worse jobs out there.

I mean yes you can be working in the Congo diamond mines. But retail is pretty much rock bottom in America.

 

[Makai]

Always wondered how Silicon Valley or other high-cost areas sustain their baristas and sandwich-makers.

Don't see how it's possible to live in a region with $1 million homes while making $7/hr.

They make more than that and they live in cheap apartments. California min wage is $10.50, and city minimums in the area are higher. $15 in Seattle. You can definitely afford an apartment with second income from roommates or family.

 

[Liljagare]

I see it all the time nowadays, young people want to be the vice-president right away.

McDonald's is beneath them, cleaning jobs are demeaning.

 

[Quixzlizx]

When I worked retail, my bosses were way worse than the customers. WAY worse.

They really try to condition you to feel like disposable garbage. In hindsight, the fact that I didn't steal/break anything and I actually showed up for all of my shifts meant that I was within the top 10% of retail employees and probably could've asserted myself more.

 

[Pyroclastic]

I do believe if everyone worked customer service for a year or 2, the world would be a better place

lol only if you had to have a psych evaluation too. some people would go postal.

 

[Mr. X]

🤔🤔🤔
Is it the low wages?
The shitty work life balance were you work holidays instead of with friends/family?
Is it the jerk customers?
Is it the frowned upon call outs when you need it?

Only thing worse is food service.

 

[DurielBlack]

It's shitty job.
It pays shit.
Benefits are shit.
Customers treat you like shit.
Managers treat you like you like shit.
You are expected to do the work of 3+ people, with a smile, and somehow never miss anything or fall behind in that work for a subsecond or 3 managers will yell at you.

The company will cut your hours, When I worked retail they would hire loads of cashiers, then give some of them as little has 4 hours a week. All to avoid paying them insurance.

I worked retail for 10 years. Then I finished finally college and moved on.

Now that I work in a professional setting things are just as shitty, except I get paid enough to actually get by.

 

[mooncakes]

I only worked retail for about 9 months when I out of highschool and was a freshman in college. I took a retail job because I just wanted a job to gain experience so I can put it on my resume. Pay was terrible, I hated the crappy hours, and especially the rude customers. What motivated to do better in college, get a few internships and to do better for myself was because of this crap retail job. I learned a lot from this job but am never ever doing retail again.

 

[demon]

I see it all the time nowadays, young people want to be the vice-president right away.

McDonald's is beneath them, cleaning jobs are demeaning.

When these often brutal jobs pay literally sub-poverty wages, they should be beneath anybody.

 

[bluehat9]

I remember working cashier at ToysRUs around christmas. Lines were super long and then my manager told me to clock out even though no one was coming in to take my place because they "couldn't afford" to pay me the crap wage for another hour or until the lines dropped. I remember shaking my head to the other cashiers since I knew they were getting ready to hear it for the rest of the night.

Then I worked black friday and a lady claimed I stole her shopping bag somehow when I was only working register. Manager asked if she wanted the security tapes checked and she disappeared, lol.

And finally, sold a guy one of those cheap tablets, he asked if we could open the box to look at it and I said no because it has a security tape on it. He buys it, then comes in an hour later saying the box only had a notebook (literally a paper notebook) in it. My manager had to deal with that and we laughed afterward even though I think she did give him a refund.

Eventually all the managers got fired for sleeping with each other or something, I don't really know, but I got a better job right after they all got replaced so I never heard the full story.

 

[CreepingFear]

I see it all the time nowadays, young people want to be the vice-president right away.

McDonald's is beneath them, cleaning jobs are demeaning.

I worked minimum wage jobs until I was 32. I don't blame anyone for not wanting to be paid and treated like shit.

 

[TurnipFritters]

I see it all the time nowadays, young people want to be the vice-president right away.

McDonald's is beneath them, cleaning jobs are demeaning.

IMO it's probably because young people have been told all their lives that those jobs are demeaning and they need to work hard and do good in school lest they end up working a dead end retail job or flipping burgers, and now they're being told that all these companies will fire most of their employees immediately if they have to pay them an actual living wage.

 

[Parch]

Only thing worse is food service.

Food service is pretty bad too, but a lot of food service (dishwashers, cooks) do not have to directly deal with the public. Servers do. At least in my time servers got tips plus minimum wage whereas kitchen staff only got minimum wage. Considering how much they made from tips, it sure seemed pretty unfair to me at the time. Having to deal with the public didn't seem like that big of a deal considering the earnings difference.

 

[Mr. X]

Food service is pretty bad too, but a lot of food service (dishwashers, cooks) do not have to directly deal with the public. Servers do. At least in my time servers got tips plus minimum wage whereas kitchen staff only got minimum wage. Considering how much they made from tips, it sure seemed pretty unfair to me at the time. Having to deal with the public didn't seem like that big of a deal considering the earnings difference.

If you get tips, they can lower your hourly wage out here. Same with comission. I woukd for sure be a bartender though.

 

[The Last Wizard]

I’ve got this problem, I’m doing computer science as a major and don’t need to be working killer hours cause of the course load but damn near every places wants you too work so many hours a day and a week:/

 

[I H8 Memes]

When unemployment is this low people move up in jobs. Why work retail or fast food when you can work entry level in an office or warehouse. One of the first complications of unemployment being too low in a capitalist economy. If the economy keeps up like this sign-on bonuses will be back soon.

 

[Angelus Errare]

I see it all the time nowadays, young people want to be the vice-president right away.

McDonald's is beneath them, cleaning jobs are demeaning.

Well "nowadays" those jobs don't pay people a livable wage like they did in the 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s.

Example, in 1975 the median price for a new house was $37,200, and the average price was $39,500. The average price of rent was $200.00 in 1975.

Before adjustment for seasonality, average hourly earnings rose 1 cent in July to $4.51 and were up 29cents from a year ago. Average weekly earnings were $164.62 ($329.24 biweekly), an increase of $1.27 from June and $8.06 from last July. Annually an hourly worker made $7,800.

Cost of various things in 1975:
Minimum wage - $2.10/hr
Tuition (public) - $1,819
Tuition (private) - $3,776
New Car (average price) - $3,800

Aforementioned adjusted for 2015:
Minimum wage - $9.16/hr
Tuition (public) - $7,938
Tuition (private) - $16,475
New Car (average price) - $16,578

Actual costs in 2015:
Minimum wage - $8.25/hr
Tuition (public) - $18,943
Tuition (private) - $42,419
New car (average price) - $31,252

And before folks say something like "minimum wage isn't meant to be a livable wage", number 1 you're spouting republican nonsense that has no basis in history.
Number 2: I'll quote the damn person (President FDR) who introduced mimimum to American the American people.

”No business which depends for existence on paying less than living wages to its workers has any right to continue in this country. By living wages, I mean more than a bare subsistence level — I mean the wages of a decent living." (1933, Statement on National Industrial Recovery Act)

Sources:
https://fraser.stlouisfed.org/scrib...ns/employment/1970s/1975-1979/empl_081975.pdf

https://www.census.gov/construction/nrs/pdf/uspricemon.pdf

http://www.thepeoplehistory.com/1975.html

 

[twopenny]

I worked in retail from 2000 to about 2012. I'd see the shit where different businesses would hire mostly elderly workers--some of whom desperately needed benefits/healthcare--and would be kept just below full-time hours. Hell, I needed healthcare during those years, but it's a practice that almost all of the major retailers did to their employees. Legal and probably absolutely necessary from a business perspective--but the consequences are something I'll never forget. I saw workers get sick and just work through it for months, years. The cycle of emergency care, bills, and low wages just grinds you down, and most folks of a certain age don't get to leave it.

 

[mozfan12]

I take Lyft on a daily basis to and from work and I can't remember the number of times a driver has told me that they've quit their low income (fast food/retail) job and just do Uber/Lyft as their main source of income. There are so many things wrong with ride sharing programs specifically when it comes to benefits and that they are not considered employees, but independent contractors.

The thing they have told me is that the flexibility is a huge benefit. So if your sick, have to take care of kids, want to go to school, etc, you don't have to go through the bureaucracy of management, where in so many workplaces not just retail/fast food it basically sees you as a terrible worker/lazy person for being a normal human who have other responsibilities outside of work/get sick.

 

[kirblar]

I take Lyft on a daily basis to and from work and I can't remember the number of times a driver has told me that they've quit their low income (fast food/retail) job and just do Uber/Lyft as their main source of income. There are so many things wrong with ride sharing programs specifically when it comes to benefits and that they are not considered employees, but independent contractors.

The thing they have told me is that the flexibility is a huge benefit. So if your sick, have to take care of kids, want to go to school, etc, you don't have to go through the bureaucracy of management, where in so many workplaces not just retail/fast food it basically sees you as a terrible worker/lazy person for being a normal human who have other responsibilities outside of work/get sick.

There are very real benefits to these sorts of arrangements to the people choosing to use them to make a living and we need to update our legal and benefits framework to better accomodate them.

 

[Stone Ocean]

So many sheltered people in this thread acting like a retail job is the worst thing that can happen to a person.

Retail work isn't fun but there are waaay worse jobs out there.

Well yeah, no shit there are worse things out there, doesn't mean that working at retail wasn't the worst experience I had with a job in my entire life

 

[FyreWulff]

I see it all the time nowadays, young people want to be the vice-president right away.

McDonald's is beneath them, cleaning jobs are demeaning.

Minimum wage has been steadily worth less and less over time

if minimum wage had kept pace with the rate of inflation, it'd be north of 20$ now.

 

[TheChamp]

Working retail is the most soul crushing job out there... somehow still surviving coming up to 3 years of it now not sure whats worse..
Grown up moms who act like 5 year olds who seriously need a slap but you have to stand there and take it because you know "the customers always right"
The awful pay like minimum even below that as its unpaid breaks (well mine are paid)
You cant have Christmas Eve, Boxing Day, Easter, New Years Eve/Day off because customers cant have ONE day where they can stay at home with family and not have the need to shop

 

[TheContact]

I worked retail 90% of my life. Last 10% has been in IT. There's some similarities, but I'll never go back to working at any kind of retail store ever again. The hours are shit, the pay is shit, and labor is shit, and dealing with the public is shit.

 

[Quonny]

If everyone worked a holiday season in retail when they were a teenager the world would be a better place.

 

[Wazzy]

Not surprising at all. The garbage pay combined with ridiculous expectations on availability and attitude from managers makes retail a shithole.

I currently work in retail and have for 5 years and it's mentally destroying. I'm finally planning to get out and it's the biggest thing I'm looking forward to. The management are lazy assholes who expect staff to do everything so they can stand around. They treat new employees like shit for not being able to do the job 2 weeks after being hired with two days "training" and no guidance.

No one wants these jobs and as of now no one is applying and many are walking out because of management and pay.

 

[ClosingADoor]

I take Lyft on a daily basis to and from work and I can't remember the number of times a driver has told me that they've quit their low income (fast food/retail) job and just do Uber/Lyft as their main source of income. There are so many things wrong with ride sharing programs specifically when it comes to benefits and that they are not considered employees, but independent contractors.

The thing they have told me is that the flexibility is a huge benefit. So if your sick, have to take care of kids, want to go to school, etc, you don't have to go through the bureaucracy of management, where in so many workplaces not just retail/fast food it basically sees you as a terrible worker/lazy person for being a normal human who have other responsibilities outside of work/get sick.

A ton of workplaces still act like a household has a stay at home mom or dad taking care of the kids, while that is simply impossible for 90% of people these days. I seriously don't get how a family gets by in America if I read all the stuff from there.

 

[Bigboss242]

Honestly the people who do stay are scum of the earth trash as humans absolute trash.

 

[Angelus Errare]

If everyone worked a holiday season in retail when they were a teenager the world would be a better place.

Or worse. Especially in the US where access to guns is pretty easy.

 

[Red Arremer]

Used to work in retail too. I was in a part of retail that's nowhere near as bad (book stores), and it still was utter shite.

Luckily in this country, book sellers are a particular branch that is "rated" higher than regular retail jobs, so I qualify for office entry jobs. I've also been able to argue myself to get re-education because of book stores dying out, so I'm going for accountancy and then aim for studying to become a teacher.

 

[Magnus]

I worked retail during my high school and college years, I would never do it again. The job itself was easy and fun but dealing with people who would look down on you sucks. Customers getting angry for not saving 5 cents, for having to show their id to buy cigs or receive money from western union, etc. However, the people I worked with were awesome and I learned to never judge people based on their careers. I honestly think everyone should do a retail or fast food job once so you never think you’re superior to that person behind the counter.

This. I really enjoyed a lot of my work in retail while in school, but wouldn't go back now for all the money in the world.

 

[zeelman]

I take Lyft on a daily basis to and from work and I can't remember the number of times a driver has told me that they've quit their low income (fast food/retail) job and just do Uber/Lyft as their main source of income. There are so many things wrong with ride sharing programs specifically when it comes to benefits and that they are not considered employees, but independent contractors.

The thing they have told me is that the flexibility is a huge benefit. So if your sick, have to take care of kids, want to go to school, etc, you don't have to go through the bureaucracy of management, where in so many workplaces not just retail/fast food it basically sees you as a terrible worker/lazy person for being a normal human who have other responsibilities outside of work/get sick.

I have a union retail job and they don’t want you to miss any work, even for medical reasons. I got so much shit for needing surgery during the Thanksgiving week back in 2015.

They really want people to just give up their whole lives for their job.

 

[Roronoa Zoro]

If you get tips, they can lower your hourly wage out here. Same with comission. I woukd for sure be a bartender though.

Yes but if you end up making less than minimum wage the employer has to make up the difference by law
That is if you don’t get enough tips

 

[bluehat9]

I have a union retail job and they don’t want you to miss any work, even for medical reasons. I got so much shit for needing surgery during the Thanksgiving week back in 2015.

They really want people to just give up their whole lives for their job.

Yep, "oh, you have sick time accumulated and a doctors note? Here's your letter of warning for being out of work."

 

[causan]

Worked retail for almost 10 years and yeah it wasn't something I would make a career of but I've worked worse jobs that made me appreciate working retail.
Three jobs I have worked that are way worse then retail are working at a car wash, working in a call center doing customer service and working in the fields harvesting lettuce.

 

[Ozigizo]

I thought retail was bad, and then I worked at a call center.

But yeah, those two are on the bottom of the list. Especially Black Friday, the worst day for anyone working retail.

 

[samn]

I see it all the time nowadays, young people want to be the vice-president right away.

McDonald's is beneath them, cleaning jobs are demeaning.

How dare they not bend over and allow themselves to be exploited

 

[JonnyDBrit]

I recently got a part time job at TK Maxx, and honestly the biggest thing that would deter me from working there as a fulltime deal (aside of my ambitions to find work in the Museum Sector) is just the simple fact of constantly being on the move. Today was just constantly pacing around the ladies' shoes department, trying to bring order to chaos. My feet are killing me after doing a full 8 hours today, no way could I- nor do I want to - do it on a daily basis for five days a week.

 

[zeelman]

I recently got a part time job at TK Maxx, and honestly the biggest thing that would deter me from working there as a fulltime deal (aside of my ambitions to find work in the Museum Sector) is just the simple fact of constantly being on the move. Today was just constantly pacing around the ladies' shoes department, trying to bring order to chaos. My feet are killing me after doing a full 8 hours today, no way could I- nor do I want to - do it on a daily basis for five days a week.

Sore feet are the least of your problems in retail.

 

[ShadowKingpin]

Customer service is soul draining and exhausting. Doing it face to face can make you pray for the sweet release of death

Beautiful words. So damn true.

 

[Mr.Monitor]

Doesn't help that tons of retail stores impose ridiculous quotas on their workers in an attempt to make up for their failing business model. Companies would rather juice their poorly paid workers for more efficiency than adapt to the changing market.

 

[Kisaya]

My experience working at IKEA for three years wasn't too bad. I had decent benefits as a part-time worker and they were flexible with my school schedule. The work was pretty draining though.

 

[Papercuts]

8 years working in a grocery store. Never. Fucking. Again.

The employees were great and the only reason I stayed sane. Most people don't last long though.

 

[TheBowen]

While I don't work retail I work with the public everyday and sometimes I wonder how people function on a daily basis. I believe everyone should work for the public one week and you will understand.

Honestly , if you made 15 year olds work just a week of retail, can gurantee they would all work harder in school ( no offense to retail workers out there, make your money)

Worked retail for parl of my gap year. Never again

 

[Kalnoky]

More money helps ease some of the pain, for sure, but is no fix for shitty business/management practices. My wife works in a restaurant and a lot of the things in this thread sound pretty similar to how they do things in that industry, too:

- Schedules are always done week to week, and your scheduled days change week to week (often for no real reason). Schedules also aren't released until the Friday before the next week.
- Everyone is scheduled weird near back to back shifts randomly (also for no real reason). For instance, my wife is regularly scheduled to work Saturday evening until midnight, then is scheduled to be back and open Sunday morning at 6:30. This isn't some new thing; she's worked at this job for 5 years.
- You're allowed "breaks", but only if it's not too busy and only if your supervisor isn't too busy to come and cover you.
- Your schedule gets cut if it's slow. You could come in for a scheduled eight hour shift and be asked to go home after two hours if the supervisor feels it's too slow.

If you have problems or feedback about any of the above, you're just told it's "the needs of the business". The end.

 

[Syphon Filter]

That's weird, I never found it as bad as you guys.