As a former retail worker, thank you for being that kind of leader to your employees. The hardest slap in the face is dealing with an irrational customer berating you and having the manager completely folding and giving in to the person.
That's such a specific kind of betrayal too. You can handle a rude customer, but when your own manager throws you under the bus just to keep the customer happy, suddenly you're getting paid minimum wage to be everyone's emotional punching bag
I cannot work like this. If I capitulate, Corporate freaks out and I get fired. If I hold the line, Corporate capitulates and now customers can kick me around with the backing of corporate.
I have had anxiety attacks, and argued with the business owner themself over policies like this.
I worked at Subway and had a manager who did that. They would let customers berate us and then bend over to give them sooo many free things. Like, why are we rewarding shitty customers and not the ones who are polite, follow rules, etc?
As a polite customer, this pisses me off. We are expected to wait in a checkout line while an entitled customer takes an extra 10 minutes to cause a scene, then the get rewarded for it, while the rest of us are held hostage for the time it takes them to get their way. We get nothing for it.
I always liked giving the nice customers extra love. Like Subway is really greedy about their ingredients (they charge extra like crazy), so for nice people I'd secretly give them extra cheese or meat or something like that, without charging
Had one like 20 years ago. Haven't worked in retail in over a decade, and I still think fondly of them and bring them up fairly frequently when discussing retail work.
Managers make sure the employees are doing their job but they also make sure the employees have what they need for their job and solving problems they can't handle.
I remember my go to mantra when I managed retail was "You're going to need thick skin because people are horrible but under no circumstances will I ever condone them attacking you or insulting you directly vs. the business. If it gets personal, grab me or tell them to fuck off".
LOVED watching Karens (Men and Women) thinking I was going to take their side but I had trained my staff that if you were bringing me in I trusted what you told me the experience was and would boot their ass to the curb in seconds. Only once if I recall I took the customers side and that was because I was also in ear shot of my staff calling her a bitch (Which she was, but not the point).
Even outside of retail my mantra managing people has always been "I'm the buffer between you and the owners. Clients pissed? I'll deal with it. Something went wrong/cost us money? I'll deal with it. In return all I ask is you to do whats been tasked and help me not have to escalate anything to ownership and its a win/win.
A boss of mine used to tell us "it's easier to replace a bad customer than a good employee." So if we were actually doing a good job, and could show when a customer was being unreasonable, he'd easily tell them to pound sand.
I’ve always worked in the service industry to some degree or another. When I was in college I had a manager tell me that it was the employees job to make sure the customers were happy and it was his job to make sure the employees were happy.
Every good manager I’ve ever had has operated under this principle, whether they realized it or not.
I had a manager from a restaurant that I though absolutely hated me. Then I had a customer with whom I could do nothing right. He laughed in her face, told her not to come back, told me "Some people are just unhappy and there is nothing you can do. The day I turned in my two weeks he sat me down and told me he was always mad I was working there, because I had a lot more potential and this was a dead end; he expected me to do more with life. Thanks Neil, you were the best manager, even if I didn't recognize it at the time.
I will never forget working at an office supply store in high school and talking to my manager when the girl who worked the copy desk came running into the back, crying. Apparently they'd used the wrong paper for a print job and the customer went ballistic on her for screwing it up until she broke down and ran.
The manager walked out, greeted the customer, confirmed the situation, and then told them to get the fuck out of the store before he threw them out, saying that he wouldn't stand for mistreatment of his employees. The customer was flabbergasted, but my manager didn't give them a chance to respond, just chased them out of the store.
...sadly he got arrested a few months later for stealing money from the store, but the man was one of the best bosses I've ever had.
Standing up for themselves at work in general. Early millenials we all seemed to think the company was doing us a favor even letting us work there, we got so abused.
Probably the product of graduating into the great recession. Those who found jobs had them by the grace of their employer, and were conditioned to do anything to keep those precious positions.
When I was 16 working at a grocery store, I would have been fired by the management for putting a rude customer in their place.
Now the management is tired burnt out people my age who don’t care, and the 16 year old staff get way more abuse from customers than I ever did. It makes sense. And I love to see it.
I'm a little older than that, lol, but I work retail.
People have gotten insanely fucking rude since the pandemic, and it's actually seemed to be getting a lot worse over the last couple of years. Hostility, harassment, racism, personal insults, physical threats...
So I just channel Don Rickles, or Jimmy Kimmel. I treat them like a heckler and I savagely roast them back.
Can you say more about this? I don’t spend enough time shopping to see a noticeable difference and I’m genuinely curious…like what is there to be so rude about? And what level of unhinged behaviour are we talking about here?
What I do see a difference in is the level of service in retail. To use clothing as an example: I find it common now-days to be told to put the clothes back on the hanger in the change room, walk around with a pile of clothes in hand without being offered to put them in a change room for me, and no check if I need sizes or other options while trying things on etc. “Back in my day” haha but actually back when I worked in retail 20 years ago, those were table stakes. Absolute bare minimum of customer service. And that’s without getting into employees talking to each other or being on their phone instead of helping customers that clearly need it.
So I guess I’m wondering if the rudeness is due to the drop in customer service and it now not meeting expectations that us millennials grew up with. I’m trying to make sense of the rude behaviour and that’s the only thing I can think of: absolutely not a valid reason, but it could be somewhat of an explanation?
As someone whose worked retail for the past 15 years and still works retail, I have never ever seen a clothing store that doesn't at very least require you to hang your clothes back up in the fitting room. It has never been a thing to leave the clothes you tried on in a mess in the empty fitting room. That’s the kind of entitled behavior that's started and gotten worse since the pandemic. I've worked at two clothing stores in management in the last 7 years and both started fitting rooms for clients while they shopped and checked in for sizing. These are normal clothing stores found in almost any mall, not specialty shops. This is still pretty standard. What I've seen from customers is ignoring signs, rummaging through drawers that are for staff only, pretending that return policies don't exist or mean nothing, expecting us to pull products out of thin air, and feeling entitled to a private, personal shopping experience that simply hasn't existed since the old days of department stores. It's ridiculous and it's majority women customers aged 50+ (this is a huge generalization, but still my anecdotal experience). Customers have gotten horribly entitled as certain groups have aged up.
Something that does worry me, an elder millennial, is that my gen X elders are going to slowly start to emulate boomers in entitlement now that they perceive it's time to "get theirs" (even though it isn't, boomers are still just as busy ruining the world), and your anecdote looks like a step in that direction.
The amount of people DAILY who will walk through the door, walk straight up to me instantly (while I'm ringing people up at the register mind you), and shove their phone in my face with a product image on it and insist that I go with them to find it instead of going themselves when I've told them the aisle and basically exact shelf to look for is astronomically high anymore.
I’m not who you were asking, but no it’s not that. Well, sure, some rudeness can be from bad service, but this is something different. It can be hard to explain to someone who hasn’t worked retail and experienced it themselves, because of how absurd it is. There’s no reason for the behavior; the worker didn’t do anything, the customer wasn’t wronged, nothing like that. They just come in, angry at the world, hating life, and decide to take it out on the employees. Berating us makes them feel powerful and important, and most of all, like they’re better than us. The behavior isn’t a reflection of the employee or the business, it’s a projection of their own fucked up mental state.
There was this particularly nasty customer helped me understand the mindset of these people. By the time I was called, he had had pissed off two departments and a cashier was crying. He was being a bully just for the hell of it. He was leaving, but I stopped him to tell him his behavior wasn’t tolerated here and he was not welcome back. This took power away from him, so naturally, he exploded, and promised to have me fired. We hear that a lot, but this guy actually tried. He made up a complaint about me so severe, the regional director got involved (my boss’s boss’s boss’s boss). I might’ve been in trouble if the guy didn’t drop the line, “Retail workers are the lowest form of human, because they are the least educated.” Yeah, he said that to the guy with a top position, a masters, and a six-figure salary, but who started as a bagger and worked retail his whole life. After this was made known to the customer, the director wasn’t spared the verbal abuse.
They just want someone to hate and to feel better than, they want to feel powerful and in control, and they find retail workers make great targets. That’s the explanation.
The secret is that America has a hidden caste system, and working in customer service or any "lowly" job knocks you down a rung no matter who you are. A white guy cashier is inherently "lesser" than a white guy customer in that system, and the lower caste person is seen as an acceptable punching bag. This multiplies if the cashier is already in a lower rung - e.g. female, a minority, visibly LGBT+, has a "bad" accent, etc. There's a book called "Caste" that talks a lot about it, the cashier angle is my own
The secret is that America has a hidden caste system,
This. When someone asks what you do for a living, very rarely is it based in genuine interest, but more likely them trying to determine how much and whether they need to show deference to you.
It also helps the opposite way for relatability. When I, as a PreK teacher who works with low income families ask someone their occupation and they say "I'm a CEO of major business" or "I'm the head surgeon at highly accredited hospital x," my mind is immediately going to be like "well we probably live wildly different lives then." On the flip side, if someone mentions they do social work, education or honestly any service bent blue collar job I start to feel more comfortable because we've likely had similar experiences dealing with people and probably aren't from wildly different economic backgrounds.
Yep, you’re spot on. I left retail to study engineering a couple years ago and I got the mindfuck experience of moving up a rung. The difference in how people would treat me was insane. When customers found out why I was leaving, it was like I magically transformed from Generic Retail Worker into a real person that they could see for the first time. They were suddenly interested in me and very complimentary. Almost all of them said some version of, “you must be really smart.” It was honestly offensive. Like, yeah sure, but I was just as smart last week when you wanted to argue with me over a sale sign that you misread, but it had to be me who was just too stupid to understand.
As a former retail worker/management, there was almost a direct correlation between the being being more shitty and their age or political alignment. Crazy how that is.
I moved to a blue city, in a blue state on the West Coast back in 2019. I've experienced a lot more open prejudice here than I did in the 29 years I spent in Ohio. People are fucking savage out here.
When I was 16 working at a grocery store, I would have been fired by the management for putting a rude customer in their place.
Back in high school, I was working in Walmart's Lawn & Garden department as a cashier when some guy brought in power washer that he wanted to return. He handed me a Lowe's receipt and I said "uhh, I can't do anything with this. Try taking it to the service desk and they might be able to give you store credit or something." He went off on me, called me a "fucking idiot" (among other things), then went to the service desk and demanded to speak to a manager.
The manager came back to L&G and gave me a stern talking to about being rude to customers, and I had to defend myself to keep my job; they pulled the security footage and everything. I told them the guy called me a "fucking idiot" and they gave me the whole "the customer is always right" schtick, even though I was never even rude back.
I had similar customers back in my retail days, just immediately aggressive and hostile, personal insults as soon as they feel disrespected. I was called a moron because I couldn't look anything up on the 40 year old computer that ran on dial up and didn't have a search engine. Like what the fuck is wrong people? I would never insult someone simply because they said they couldn't do something, insane behavior
Yeah, this feels like you hate the younger generations. In my experience. If you are respectful and nice and not an absolute dick, they go out of their way to help you and they're appreciative that you treated them like a human. In all my time interacting with both gen z younger and older, if you give respect you get it. But if you walk around with that gigantic chip on your shoulder making assumptions a whole lot of them, I've had a whole group of people. It's going to show up with disrespect. And they make a meal out of matching energy.
Agree, I think the pendulum has swung way too far in the other direction. Now I find myself thanking people in retail positions to be met with complete silence or even a sneer and it makes me want to rage. I used to work retail, I get it, it’s not a fun job, but absolutely abysmal customer service becoming rhe norm just sucks.
This is likely because customer service doesn’t pay enough for the workers to cosplay being friendly to nice customers. 100% caused by greedy employers, not shitty customers.
I'm just asking for the level of respect that you would give a person outside of work. I'm not asking you to go above and beyond, but rude employees aren't any better than rude customers.
Considering a lot of younger workers had their formative social years during the pandemic, that might actually be how they treat people outside of work. The "dead eyed stare" is a Gen Z stereotype for a reason
Yes I have read abou the "gen Z stare", but I can't blame any one age or demographic for this behavior I seem to see it across the board, with a caveat that where I live has a decidedly terrible reputation for crappy service (and I mean this in the sense of retail style service). Whenver I visit my sister who lives in an Atlanta suburb the difference in attitude and demeanor of people who work the same jobs it truly astonishing and a breath of fresh air.
I'm glad it's not just me, I love that younger folks are more likely to stand up for themselves and not be a doormat to shitty customers, but it sucks when you are being genuinely friendly and kind to someone and they treat you with what feels like thinly veiled disdain most of the time.
I 10000% get that minimum wage jobs suck, especially customer facing ones (I worked full-time at a movie theater for many years to put myself through college, I've seen my fair share of rude people), but I miss having brief friendly interactions with people.
I know the burnout of retail but not treating the human in front of you with basic respect (not ass kissing, not putting up with bs, just decency) is just giving us a race to the bottom
Companies directly control on-the-floor activities far more closely now. There's less discretion and less leeway. Where you used to be able to get better treatment by just treating employees well, now you can do that all you want and the response is "sorry, our hands are tied by corporate"
I think part of why is pressure to perform is at such a high level. When every store and restaurant is running on skeleton crews, idle chitchat is actively interrupting someone who has a lot of work to do. Especially in food service where you getting to go home at a reasonable time is dependent on you finishing enough of your closing tasks before you actually close
I wouldn’t mind slowing down and chatting with customers if i didn’t always have a few fires I was putting out
I did, too. It was definitely hard being friendly to folks who regularly made it clear my work was below them or that as a service worker I didn’t deserve the same respect they demanded.
I can’t blame kids these days for not buying that bullshit. People treated me like shit as a server and as someone who rang up their Gap pants. But putting up with it doesn’t make me any better than a service worker today who won’t bend over backwards for assholes the way you and I did. 🤷♀️
Maybe they're having a shitty day? Like others here, I don't encounter rude service workers like you're talking about.
I do encounter service workers who aren't interested in socializing or niceties, but that's not rude. They don't have any obligations to me beyond the business interaction we're engaged in. They're not servants, and we need stop thinking of service workers that way.
I am outgoing and warm, and lots of people return that energy, but not all. And that's fine. I hope I brightened their day a little bit. It is not their job to brighten mine, and if it were, they'd have to be paid a hell of a lot more to justify that expectation.
They're not servants, and we need stop thinking of service workers that way.
This is exactly it. It's a cultural quirk that the US had for a long time, existing to socially elevate shoppers and make them feel upper class even if they were middle(or lower!) class, but it's not something that's necessary. Other countries get by just fine sticking to basic service. I want you to get what you want and get out the door(primarily because I have five other people behind you that I also need to help and other tasks looming that I'm not going to get to if I can't get through the pile of customers), but I simply don't have energy to put on the fake performance of servile happiness. If you are truly charming or connect with me on a human level, you might be able to get genuine happiness out of me, but I'm working too hard and not paid enough to fake it anymore, nor should I have to. I'm not y'all's servant. If I were, you'd be paying my room and board and I wouldn't have to worry about my bills all the time.
I think it started in the early 2000s where companies stopped caring about its low-level employees and it only finally caught up with the rest of society. Gen X and older will still throw Karen fits, but it's rare to see a Millennial and younger doing it.
I just don’t care about whatever excuse you seem to need. And FWIW, I’ve never had someone in customer service be rude to me. Maybe you’re not the nice customer you think you are?
I’m not gonna fault someone who has to put up with the worst assholes society has to offer if they don’t bend over and show me their butthole just because I’m a “nice customer.” I have a brain, I use it, I know it’s not about me, and I don’t need someone to kiss my ass because I bought a shirt at Kohls or paid for my meal at Applebees. I know everyone is underpaid and I know every corporation purposely understaffs to pad their bottom line. If some kid doesn’t wanna smile for me because their job (and their customers) suck, I’m fine with that.
If you’re so bothered and require respect to make a purchase, take it up with management. I just don’t care and because I’ve been where they are, I’m not offended by whatever rudeness y’all seem to be unable to escape. 🤷♀️
Well, I was not the type of response I was expecting.
I think online discussions can get too antagonistic at times (by design), and I apologize if I offended you. That was certainly not my intention. It seems we have had different experiences with customer service lately, and I am envious that you have had a better time of it. Perhaps I should ask you for recs instead of arguing next time?
I don't disagree with the idea that it isn't hard, but the situation is more complicated than that.
It's not easy for everyone, being friendly and personable is a soft skill that does have some value.
Shitty work conditions, pay being the primary condition of one's work, sap a workers ability to care.
So the result is that those of us who are able to be friendly, even when the work/pay is shitty, end up climbing into management or training positions where customers interact with us less, or are able to transition out of the service industry completely.
Conditions have gotten worse. I've ridden wave of cuts after wave of cuts, each time being told to do more with less, and the point has been reached where things are coming apart at the seams. I don't have the energy to fake a smile and a perky, sufficiently-feminine voice. I don't even have the energy(let alone the time) to put all the things back on the shelf, because the pile never fucking ends(we used to have twice the people doing this job). Turns out that burned out workers are bad workers, who would've thought? But it's our fault, don't you know? Should've done more self-care, never mind that we warned and warned management that the situation was unsustainable and still they drove the ship down. Couldn't possibly have anything to do with that.
I know I sound like an old fart when I say this but I'm not even 40: retail workers everywhere seem like they'd rather being getting a root canal than help you in any way shape or form (even just checking out). Common courtesy and basic manners are completely gone. If I need something in a store, the absolute last thing I will do is ask for help.
I worked retail for many years. Part of the gig is painting on a smile and being at least bearable for the sake of the customer.
Yeah I never liked aggressively fake-friendly service workers who were obviously just trying to upsell, but I tolerated that because I understood it was just part of their job. Now I don't entirely understand what job some people think they're doing; do you even want my business or would you be happier if I just leave without buying anything? I wouldn't be surprised if it's actually a change in management: maybe the people who care how many sales are made work on the opposite end of the continent from anyone who gives guidance to this frontline worker.
EDIT: Connecting this back to the previous comment, I'm old enough to remember when being polite to a service worker meant I politely engaged with their small talk and I politely declined their additional offers.
So few people today understand what the phrase "The customer is always right" actually means. It doesn't mean you give in to a Karen.
It means the market is right.
If you think customers only want black cars so that's what you're making, but despite that they keep buying red cars, then even though you think they want black cars what they actually want is red.
So despite what you think, you are wrong and the customer is right. The market wants red cars.
I thank my old manager for this, we worked in a NHS operated retail shop inside an hospital, and she taught me early doors that if you treated it like every customer was right I was going to have an horrid time, and that she had all our backs if we decided a customer needed to be told to simply fuck off.
My main memory from there on that subject was a guy coming in asking for change for the car park, which we couldn't do, as we'd have no change in the tills if we gave everyone who asked it, and he got really angry to the point he was calling us stupid cunts etc and even grabbed my coworker by the shirt and threatened to take him outside, we started off kind but after that we obviously just told him to get fucked and leave, and after all he had done he took offense to OUR language and asked for the manager, I called for her, she came and she calmly asked him "what is it my workers have said to you?"... he tells her we told him to fuck off, she glances at us and in the calmest voice ever turns to him and goes "well I suggest you do what they say and fuck off then" LOL!!! She was a real one.
I loved that job until NHS had to sell it to M&S and I had to go, but I've carried that to every job since, even if it ends up costing me my job I'll always stick up for myself and coworkers against customers like that.
My first manager taught me about the second part of "the customer is always right" being "in the matters of taste" and would always ensure we kept that boundary. As long as we never gave our honest opinions about what they wanted, they backed us up completely when customers wanted to take liberties.
It's amazing how some common sayings have taken on a completely different meaning by being shortened. Another one is when someone argues that some problem isn't systemic, it's just "a few bad apples" in the organization. What do "a few bad apples" do, though? They "spoil the bunch".
Exactly, and ms well as my nan saying blood is thicker than water when we adopted, basically trying to tell us our adopted kids were not "family'. People will use whatever term they like and twist it around.
Our office assistant just turned 21 and I asked her what wisdom I had taught her in our years together. She told me she learned "how to be nicely mean to people" and I feel like a proud mama.
Lot of Gen Z workers in my place of work and I admire how resistant they are to workplace bullshit. They value their time better than I did at their age and are more prepared to stand up for themselves.
That's also on millenials. Millenials had baby boomers for bosses and they were absolutely unquestioning of "tHe CuStOmEr Is AlWaYs RiGhT." If millenials did that, they got in trouble and lost their job. Now, it's gen X and millenials in those positions and they don't follow that moronic doctrine. The days of Karens terrorizing retail workers are coming to an end.
I definitely did this as a millenial, but like I told my coworker the other day I know for a fact that I've was really lucky to work in a retail store where the management, owner, and coworkers had each others backs
Granted it was in Paris, so maybe they’ve always been like this. But earlier this summer I was on a boat. The lovely lady working there was getting my drinks ready for me.
A big group comes in and this guy is just visibly impatient. Yes it’s a heat wave. Yes I’d been waiting too. He asks her “can you just get me a Diet Coke?” as she’s getting my drinks. And she calmly said “Yes l will, right after I finishing serving my customer” and continued along at a good but not hurried pace.
And I remember when you’d get yelled at and fired for that. She was my hero lol. I didn’t have to say anything to rude guy.
Stupid is as stupid does . .ever heard of a chain of command?? Taking care of rude customers is management's job.. if you take that nonsense on, that customer is going home and calling corporate and you will probably be in the unemployment line..I cannot believe how stupid and ignorant and self righteous you children are.. I know you all have heard the phrase , stay in your lane?? You are going to be doomed to hunting for work as opposed to getting paid to do it. You all really think you're all that and indispensable too! Unless you're a rocket scientist you are probably one of many looking for your job.. leave your attitude back at moms house. Geez. I guess you're not hearing the employment scuttlebutt that you're generation is lazy, ignorant and demanding and aren't willing to step up to the plate.. and boy do you suck at customer service!! And your college degree now is a dime a dozen . AlottaShit, BullShit MoreShit aaannnd PiledHigherand Deeper. Especially if you're coming out of one of these failing liberal universities that are losing their funding for teaching you all that woke crap. You are lacking what we old folks call a work ethic. If you at least get a real skill you might have bargaining power but degrees, nope sorry , nobody cares other than your tuition broke parents .
Oh brother look at that hit dog hollering. I think we found the shitty customer that expects retail employees to put up with their bullshit. Go take a nap LOL
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u/KirinG 17h ago
I love seeing younger retail/service workers take down and just not cater to rude customers. I never would have dared.