Stories of a Supermarket

Working in a supermarket isn’t just about stacking shelves, nor is it about making items go beep through a till. For the thousands and thousands of people who do so, it is more than that.
A job in a supermarket for many, is just a job. They come in, do their work and leave. For others, it turns into their career and acts as a stepping stone. I honestly believe that most people who end up working in a supermarket are there because they just needed a job. As with every job, you need to have a laugh with your colleagues. For one it makes the day go quicker, but also if you do work in a supermarket, its hard not to have a giggle at many of the weirdos that pass through its doors on a daily basis.

I have been at this supermarket for five years now, and it still amazes me what people want from me, and how people treat retail workers.

Working on the fresh produce department. Fruit and Veg flown from all over the world to this one location. The heart of the store and right at the front too. In this day and age, people expect far too much. They want top quality products, the reddest of tomatoes, the curviest of bananas and the roundest of melons. In England, people like to moan. I mean really moan. I don’t think I’ve ever done more than ten minutes on the shop floor without hearing ‘oh these peppers aren’t big enough ‘ , or ‘these carrots are massive’. Some people actually believe that I’m the one who grew the stuff, one woman said to me ‘these grapes look lovely today, think you picked them at just the right time’ and gave me a pat on the back. Spending around 40 hours a week in the same place for three years, you get to know it. Just like you get to know your home, the streets around it and whose car belongs to which neighbour. So for me, just like many others it can be very frustrating when customers think they know what you sell. For instance, an elderly man comes up to me, very polite at first and asks where the fresh Jerusalem Artichokes are. I say to him in a nothing but a friendly manner that we don’t sell them and offer him the tinned variety. ‘Oh’ he said, ‘I got them here last week’. I politely tell the man that its a line we haven’t ever sold. ‘Oh well you probably don’t know much then do you’ , I say to the man politely that I’ve worked on the department for three years and not once have we sold the product he is looking for. ‘I think you’re wrong’ he says, ‘i definitely bought them here last week’. So at this moment I’m feeling like someone has sky plussed me and has rewound, as I find myself telling the man for the fourth time that it isn’t a line we have sold. He gets louder telling me I dint know my job, this would be the millionth time Ive wanted to smack a customer in the face today but I remain calm and tell him he must of bought them from another supermarket. He yells at me stating he doesn’t shop at other supermarkets, demands that I show him where the product is, and then , like a light bulb has just been switched on says to me ‘ahh I remember I got them from Waitrose, I’ll be off then’ , walks out of the shop without an apology or even a hint of shame.

A lot used to frustrate me on this department. One main pet hate of mine was those small clear bags people use to put their fruit and veg into. I can see the use of them if you’re buying about 10 apples, or a handful of tomatoes. But when I see people reach up , pull out a chunk of bags, rip one off and put inside just one large potato then mutter to themselves, ‘this supermarket needs to go green’ it really does take the biscuit.

Working in the coffee shop. Where most people come to have that milky brew and relax after purchasing their box of cereal and a packet of custard creams. Being in the coffee shop, a small place within the store with about 10 tables, you get to know the regulars. You even hear their life stories as they ask you for a frothy cappochino with skimmed milk and a couple of sugars. Now I’m the sorta person who will just talk without thinking. An elderly man walks up to the counter. Asks me for a tea so I grab a teapot and put some hot water in it. I took his money and I asked if he wanted a pot of milk. For some unknown reason I say to the poor bugger ‘do you want a semi or a whole?’ , obviously meaning semi skimmed or whole milk. Me realising what I had said struggled so so hard to hold back on the laughter. He looks at me with a weird smile and said out of the corner of his mouth ‘ I’ll have a semi please’. Hadn’t laughed that much at work until this man walked away, my colleague was literally on the floor and this poor man, well, he walked off with not just a semi in his cup of tea..

Working in the customer service desk. At the front of the store. Where 99% of angry people tend to wander towards. The other 1% just chatter to themselves as they leave. The main department seeing as every single person who enters the store uses it. Now all supermarkets and most customer serving companies are measured secretly on customer service, this is why nearly 100% of the time, no matter what is said to you and in what tone, you still have to be as polite as you can whilst grinning like you’re on speed. The less than 1% of the time is when it’s allowed to be rude, and say what you feel. This rarely happens, but it does, and only happens when customers are so rude and obnoxious and clearly aren’t measuring you on your service skills, they’re just irate because they were overcharged by a matter of pence, or because they’ll have to go without their favourite packet of biscuits for a few days. People bring back things for refunds, which is understandable. Some you accept, and some you have to refuse, wether it being a branded item with no reciept or they just picked up the wrong flavour of Walkers. But when a gentleman is infront of you, showing you pictures of his dead dog to prove he doesn’t need the dog food anymore, you really can’t refuse can you?

Working in such an inclosed environment, it’s like being inside a pressure cooker about to blow. Relationships tend to happen, flings happen, and apparantly so do a gay man getting a woman pregnant. And yes this was about me. Me and one of my colleagues were quite close, we didn’t have ‘a thing’ or anything like that, we attended a works Christmas prty and after a few days the whole store thought we were together and she was having my baby. Rumours spread like wildfire, and 99% of the time they are untrue. But there is however, that 1% chance that whatever secret you are hiding, whoever you have slept with in the workplace, eventually everybody will find out. I’ve learnt that the hard way.

Retail workers get treated like dirt and get spoken to as if they are utter scum. Sometimes things are out of your control, such as a national bank just halting all transactions due to a securtiy breach, therefore causing utter mayhem for about 10 minutes. Workers in supermarkets get blamed for everything. I got blamed for the Volcanic Ash distruption back in 2010, apparantly it was my fault that a volcano in a different country had erupted causing flights to be cancelled, therefore us unable to get any supplies of fuit or veg in.

So there you have it, if you work in retail, be expected to be blamed for everything, and I mean everything. So pin your ears back, stick on that fake smile and just get on with your day.


© copyright 2012-10-22 21:16:57 UTC - All Rights Reserved

Keep Running...

I had the dream again. The one that wakes me up most nights.
I keep seeing you there, in front of me. You give me that same smile, the same one you gave me the very first time we saw each other, the first time our eyes met. The smile that carried my heart away . You're speaking to me, but I cant hear the words. Only the roaring of the wind fills my ears.
Then you turn and you start to run, You look over our shoulder as if to say 'follow me'. So I do. I began to run. I run as fast as I can, faster and faster trying to catch you. But you get further and further away with every footstep. I just cant keep up with you. You become a vanishing point in the distance, an impossible stretch that I want to bridge, that I would give anything and everything to cross. But you're gone.You've left me behind and now I’ve lost you.
In the dream, I collapse onto my knees fists pounding into the ground, cursing myself for not trying harder to stay with you. I can feel it building inside of me,  pain, loss, regret and shame. I tilt my head back as my soul gathers all my frustration and sorrow together and I let out a howl. But no sound issues. Only a completely and silent scream. Tears streaming down my eyes, the silence continues from deep within me , until at long lost, I can stop, exhausted.
And then I awake. Darkness. The sorrow takes hold of my heart and the tears that I had shed in the dream world find their way into the real world.
So in the daylight I run, I push myself to be faster, stronger in the hope that in the night , when I dream again, I can keep pace with you. I can follow you. By day I try, by night I fail. And I dread the night that you don’t appear, you don’t smile. Because then I know you will be far gone, that I could never hope of catching up with you ever again. I have just got to keep running.

I keep telling myself that I'm stronger, and all the effort I put in to running through the streets, along the river and through the countryside, all this effort will make its way into my dream.. it needs to if I want to have hope that I can someday catch you...

Sometimes I have good dreams, good dreams where I feel like I'm getting closer to catching you up. Then sometimes I have bad dreams, bad dreams where nothing happens and all my anger and all my frustration leap out of my body and unleash themselves into the real world. This is what I was afraid would happen... but I still keep telling myself that I have got to keep running....

I keep thinking about you. Who are you? Will I ever catch up with you? Why do I dream about you night after night? Every morning you're the first thing I think of , and I think of you before I fall asleep. But I think about you for the wrong reason, the very reason why I push and push myself to catch up with you. I want to know what happens if I ever do catch up with you. It seems like I'm in love with you as I cannot stop thinking about you, but you're just a part of my imagination, or are you?
I don't recognise you, so surely you are someone my mind had made up, someone who I want to be with. For months now, I have dreamt about you. For months, I train myself during the day, to hopefully catch you and finally find out why this has been happening. But I can't. In the dream world I stop running even though I know I can do so for miles, but it's you. You get further and further away without gaining speed. You still smile at me, the same smile all those months ago. You seem to like the chase, you like having someone so desperately want to catch up with you that it makes you feel powerful. But one day, I'll give up. Give up pushing myself, give up wanting to catch up with you because in every dream I do, I fail and it will get boring. But not now, I can't stop dreaming about that smile, and it's going to kill me not knowing why you're there.


© copyright 2012-10-22 21:16:57 UTC - All Rights Reserved