Anyone who has ever worked stressful retail jobs can assure you, no, the customer is most certainly not always right. The entitlement and toxicity you sometimes see among consumers close to the holidays is mind-boggling. And it’s likely to make you lose the remaining smidgen of faith you still had in humanity.
To prepare for this year’s run-up to the Thanksgiving and Christmas shopping season, we’re featuring some of the most horrifying and nightmarish things that retail workers had to deal with on Black Friday. Scroll down for a crash course on how no sane human being should ever behave.
#1
I really appreciated what the store manager said to us Best Buy customers waiting in line to get in the store. First of all they handed out coupon type things to those in line, offering each item to the front of the line first and then walking to the back and so on. So it was like you had your item in hand before you ever went into the store as long as no one stole it. Anyway, the manager makes an announcement via megaphone:
“Alright. So we all know it’s Black Friday. And we have some really great deals here at Best Buy. But this will NOT be one of those crazy stores you hear about on the news. We are going to be civil adults here. And if you aren’t acting like a civil adult, my staff has been instructed to have you removed for the safety of all customers. They know that I am absolutely serious about this request.
We will be letting you into the store 5 at a time. If you try to get pushy, you will be asked to leave the line. We will let you in in the order you are standing. There’s no reason to be pushy here. You will all be let into the store in a timely fashion.
Once again. We’re civil adults, and this store is NOT going to be one of those places where people get trampled or injured.”
I really, really respected how blunt the guy was, and I thought it was the easiest BF experience I have had to this day.
Image source: tubernonster, JuiceFlair / Envato
#2
I worked at a shoe store for 6 years. Honestly, it was seeing the huge mound of empty (stolen) shoeboxes pile and pile up in the back. I hate shoplifting with a passion, and seeing box after box that we didn’t catch just pissed me off royally.
And I hated that every year we opened earlier and earlier, to compete with the other retail stores. Many coworkers had family hours away, and they had to turn around *on Thanksgiving* to drive back to be there that night when the store opened.
I don’t work retail anymore but I refuse to go anywhere on Thanksgiving night. Those workers have families too, and they deserve to have ONE day to themselves. You can wait until 5am on Black Friday, don’t try to be selfish and push it back to having the store open at 10pm thanksgiving night. Give me a break and have some respect for your fellow human.
Image source: Currywursts, Rawpixel / Envato
#3
I got punched in the face because I didn’t know what a zhu zhu pet was.
Image source: loafmcloaf, reddit
#4
I was scheduled to work 6am-5pm. My lunch was scheduled at 8am. Not much of a breakfast person, I chose to only consume a granola bar before getting back to work. As the hours go by I find that the demanding circumstances (I was behind the register) coupled with hunger is making me feel a tad light-headed.
At 2pm I am denied a 15 minute break to eat something a tad more substantial. At 3pm an ambulance arrives due to the fact that a young, female sales associate has hit the tile, and is probably suffering from a concussion due to her delirious ramblings about wearing mismatched socks.
That sales associate was me. I recovered just fine, but at 4pm my boss called me from the hospital bed and inquired, “Are you coming back to work?”
And that’s why I am now a bartender.
Image source: peacelovewaffles, wirestock / Envato
#5
My first day working for Best Buy was on black Friday 8 years ago. I was controlling part of the line since I had zero training to do anything else. I had a lady saying she was going to faint. She kept saying “please just let me pay so I can get to a doctor”. I knew she was lying and called my manager over so he could talk to her. He said “ma’am, they told me you were in need of medical assistance, I’ve got an ambulance on the way” she freaked out yelling at my manager about the line being too long and how it was his fault she was feeling sick. She looked at me and said “this is all your fault you little jerk, if you would have just let me cut the line we’d be out of this mess”. I couldn’t help but smile, my manager old her to leave and if she didn’t he would call the cops. She tried to stay until a random cop came in to check out the crowd. She left so quick. That was my first of 5 black Fridays with Best Buy.
Image source: mammajrocks, GroundPicture / Envato
#6
Manager at GameStop: kid pooped on our floor because his mom didn’t want to leave and have to stand in line again.
Image source: anon, Gerain0812 / Envato
#7
Not a story, just a word of thanks to those in this thread who work retail on this shittiest of all days. The tales of avarice I’ve read and seen myself on BF have led me to a new tradition: refusing to spend a single dime this weekend.
Image source: anon, Getty Images
#8
I’m from Canada and our version of Black Friday is Boxing Day(Dec 26th). I worked in a sporting good store and the hardest thing to get through the customers head was when we were out of a product we were out. There wasn’t anything in the back, I couldn’t give you a rain check for the product and if it was another day of the year I would have been more then happy to call any other store in the city and have the product shipped to you but on this day I just couldn’t do that.
Image source: CanadaEh97, Masson-Simon / Envato
#9
When I worked in retail I was working at a small hardware store. We opened at 7 or something on Black Friday which is an hour early. There were several cardboard cutout people that we had to advertise for paint. One was a purple man that was about 6′ tall.
I’m standing at my register at ~6:30 am because we had to be there early, even though we didn’t open for another 30 minutes…we all knew the owner would open the doors a little before 7 and let people in. Well…there was no line at 6:30 (not uncommon). One person shows up right around then while I’m counting my register in. He proceeds to do the usual “I want my cheap stuff now! now later when you’re open!” thing.
Early Customer (EC) – Hello?! ARE YOU GUYS OPEN?
At this point everyone else was in the back of the store setting things up and I was alone up front out of view of the door…but I could look over this window ledge and see him. I didn’t really want to deal with him but I started to walk around from my register (after closing it of course) and was about to say something to him when he starts talking again.
EC – I know you’re in there! I can see you! What? You’re not even going to say a word to me? This is terrible service, you’re incredibly rude.
I have no idea what’s happening…I’m not within view of the guy yet…finally I realize he’s talking to a large purple cutout of a man. I proceed to go open the doors and try to explain this to him.
Me – Sir, I’m sorry we wont open for another 15 or 20 minutes. (Trying to ignore the elephant in the room; him talking to cardboard).
EC – Why wont that guy acknowledge me?!? Why is he being rude, he could have just as easily told me that you weren’t open yet. I should get a coupon.
Note: The purple dude was maybe 6′ from the door. It’s not like he was yelling at a silhouette across the store.
Me – Ummmm…sorry, that’s just a display advertisement for our paint sale today.
EC – Well that’s stupid, you shouldn’t be able to put things up like that, they might scare people. It’s really rude, you guys should know better than that.
Me – WAT. (Didn’t say it but I thought it).
EC proceeded to berate the other employees throughout the store over the hour or so he was picking up the cheapest items he could get his hands on…finally tried to bargain for 20% off on account of the “rude cardboard guy” (his words not mine). Manager says “Ah, no.” (Direct quote). The guy wasn’t old/senile…but apparently he needed glasses…badly.
Image source: jdpatric, bnenin / Envato
#10
Worked at walmart during college a few years back. Because walmart keeps the store open unlike say target or other stores we are setting up the merchandise right in front of the customers, it’s literally like setting up a buffet in front of hungry bears or something…
When it came time to release the video games a guy literally jumped over the crowd of people and into the game display knocking it over. Games went everywhere and it turned into a mob trying to get the games. No one was hurt except for the guy and a couple of COD games
Another story that happened that black friday was when we opened up the display for the board games. This old lady, i’m talking maybe in her 80’s, had two empty carts and when we opened it up she grabbed as many as she could fit in the two baskets… nothing really wrong with this until she started ripping the games from some little kids hands and throwing them in her cart.
You see the worst of people on Black Friday.
Image source: LikeMike2224, DC_Studio / Envato
#11
There’s a rule out there, nothing good happens after 2am. That also goes for shopping.
Image source: JeepNomad, ShiftDrive / Envato
#12
I held a seasonal position stocking at Target last year. They trained me on the registers for about 3 hours so I could back them up if need be. Black Friday comes around and I volunteered for the time and a half pay that comes along with checkout. IIRC the first lady to come into my line had like a large screen tv, maybe a 40 or 50 inch model, that barely fit in the cart. I whip around the register with my scan gun and the barcode is on the bottom of the box. Now, the box is aligned lengthwise down the the length of the cart, width-wise it’s sticking straight up with it’s lower-most corner seated in the cart, and the back resting on the handle. The customer walks around the side of the box to look as some gum or something. That’s when I lift the front of the box out of the cart, balancing it on my hand and the handle of the car, and scan it. I check the computer at the register to make sure it scanned, and that’s when I felt the weight start to feel awkward on my hand. I look back, and whad’ya know, the box is starting to tip over. So I dropped the scanner, used my right hand to try and steady the box, but this just creates a fulcrum. It revolves around my right and, tips over, and hits the lady right on top of her head. I was so embarrassed but she assured me she wasn’t hurt and everything was fine.
Image source: pepsivanilla93, MaplesImages / Envato
#13
It was my 2nd year at Target and I happened to be in a sling from shoulder surgery. I needed the money so I continued to work through the holidays with really only arm to use. On black friday I came in and automatically I was pretty much 2nd in charge in my area just due to the fact that everyone around me was a new person. Nobody had any idea of what was going on. My manager left for a 15 minute break. You think in 15 minutes what could go wrong, well.. it went wrong. I was working on packing out toys and one of my co-workers comes up to me saying she has a situation she doesn’t know how to handle. A black lady was quite angry that there were no black barbies on the shelf, only white ones. I was completely understanding of the problem, I just told the lady that a lot of the toys were gone and we were working to get them out. Nope… She needed that barbie now. I told her just to have patience and we will work on it, but nope.. I was a racist. Yeah, screaming at me that I was a racist and the store was full of racist. I had to get some other manager to help me.. this lady now doesn’t care about the barbie, just that I am a racist. Eventually my Store Manager has to come over and personally go sift through the boxes in the back for the barbie. Well, of course there was no black barbies. The lady screamed at me some more, told me she was going to write to corporate (like they care) about me. My employees got a kick out of it, but I didn’t. I was really upset over the whole situation, I like to see myself as an open minded person. That is really when I realized dealing with the public sucked.
TLDR; One arm in a sling, surrounded by newbs, Corporate heard I am a racist.
#14
I worked at Walmart on black friday ages ago. not sure they do this everywhere or just around here, but they would have sale bikes already put together and hanging from the high ceiling from hooks. these would not be the Black friday bikes, just normal sale stuff. I had the misfortune to be getting one of those bikes down at the time they started the sale. I was on top of one of those giant ladders to get the bike off the metal hooks that in hung from, when a crowd of people completely charged past me knocking the ladder out of the way on over. By sheer luck I grabbed on to the bike and was hanging from it a good 20 feet over the concrete floor. It took about 3 minutes for some other workers to muscle through the crowd and get the lader set back up for me to get down.
Image source: gouge2893, David Montero
#15
This woman picked up the most expensive 3D/bluray player from electronics and insisted she was handed it by the workers passing out the Black Friday sale DVD players. I informed her that I couldn’t sell it to her for the discount price and she refused to leave the line until she spoke to a manager. When management showed she screamed at them until they told me to change the price. It’s people like her that make it intolerable.
Image source: MrRogersinaScubaSuit, bnenin / Envato
#16
A friend of mine had his wrist broken during a Black Friday thing. Someone pushed him out of their way to get at something and he went over a shopping cart.
This was in a clothing store in a mall, not even a major department store.
Image source: rawbamatic, DC_Studio / Envato
#17
A guy came for our Black Friday sale not to buy stuff but to sue us. He intentionally spilt food on the floor and walked back over to slip in it. He have himself a concussion and started throwing up. He tried to sue until we showed his lawyer the video.
Image source: anon, Josué Sánchez
#18
My first BF, we had a guy camp out for days. He bought a bunch of stuff then returned it an hour later. He told us he just does it for the thrill…. Weirdo.
Image source: anon, Levi Meir Clancy
#19
I worked Black Friday at Toys R Us twice. That day brings out the worse in people. It was like a episode of The Walking Dead. A fight broke out because someone cut someone in line. I had a lady get mad at me because I couldn’t leave my register to help her with a item. 8pm- 6am. So many murderous thought running through my mind at 4am from lack of sleep.
Image source: muffinkittyXOXO
#20
I’m dating myself here. When I was in college I worked at a toy store and it was the year of the Furbies. They were really hard to get and our site only got 10 of them.
We were instructed to pass out numbers rather than the actual toys to the first 9 in line. (One was donated) I was the lucky one to pass out numbers.
When we opened our doors it was pretty organized because we had set up lines and it was also a high end neighborhood. I gave the first person their number and then all of a sudden I am tackled from behind.
This woman slammed into me and knocked me to the floor and ripped the tickets out of my hand, breaking two fingers. All for numbers.
How dumb was she? The store refused to give her a furby for her numbers and was trying to detain her until the cops showed up but she decked our manager and walked out.
Image source: CharistineE, Go to Nikola Đuza’s profile Nikola Đuza
#21
I saw a small woman just *take* a Blu-Ray player from the hamds of a man almost as small. I know it doesn’t sound so extreme, but the guy just looked so sad and helpless.
#22
I worked at a Walmart supercenter that had just opened and it was their first Black Friday sale. They had three police officers and two of the largest support managers they had escort a pallet of the 400 dollar laptops out to the floor. Immediately a crowd started forming around them. When they threw off the cardboard it was like people transformed into animals. People climbing over one another and grabbing them out from other people’s hands. There were people stealing them out from other people’s carts. It was crazy.
Image source: nihil161
#23
I had someone tear down a sign and bring it to the register to prove to me the price of the item. The sign was for a different item.
Image source: SharkSocks, Getty Images
#24
Last year was the first and only time I worked retail on black Friday. It was hell. I worked 14 hours nonstop. I’m sure that that’s illegal. I had so many customers it was driving me insane. It was then that I vowed to leave retail and never work retail again.
Image source: abarua01, majid dadkhah
#25
Since I had previous experience at Sears, they decided it would be appropriate to rehire me with my first day being Black Friday (in a completely different department). Not only did I have no idea what was going on, I didn’t know any of my co-workers and they didn’t know I was starting that day.
That was the easy part. When I got a lunch break, I went to the parking lot and my car was stolen. What a day.
Image source: talikfy
#26
The Black Friday’s that I worked weren’t ever really that bad.
There was one time though, when I worked at a FYE at a mall. We opened at 5am that year and there was an unexpected line of people waiting to come in. We weren’t boasting any big sales, so we thought it was weird.
I was the one cashier on duty and my first few customers had iPods. I ring them up, they come up full price. The customers tell me it’s a Black Friday sale, and I say it isn’t. I ask my manager (the only other employee in the store), who says he wasn’t aware of us having an iPod sale. One of the ladies shows us a newspaper flier saying they were on sale, so my manager tells me to ring them up with the sale price.
Now, if it wasn’t so busy, and it wasn’t just he and I running the store, maybe one of us would have noticed the tiny asterisk on the flier that said the big sales only pertained to free standing stores, as in, ones not in a mall. We didn’t notice that until later. Why would a store have a sale for certain stores only, and why wouldn’t they make it more clear?
Image source: Tammy_Tangerine
#27
I manage a Verizon wireless store, on one really busy BF I had a customer lose his mind on one of my reps because our contact transfer machine lost the contacts on his sons phone. I jumped in to try and calm things down and release my poor sales rep. The guy spent the next 10 minutes screaming at me, demanding I give him free products because of the inconvenience. When I continued to refuse, he got right up in my face and raised his hand as if he was going to grab me. I’m not a really big guy, but I’m 6’2″ 230lbs, and I looked at him dead in the eye and said “sir, I would really not touch me, if I were you.” he backed off a bit but continued to scream at me. I ended up having to call the cops to have him removed from the store.
Side note, his 10 yr old son was with him, and lost a total of 8 contacts.
Image source: Dakmannella
#28
Last year a woman went into labor in front of my store. Because it was so busy the paramedics had a really hard time reaching her so she almost had to give birth in the mall.
Image source: kokopellii, Colin + Meg
#29
A few years back my stepdad went to black friday just to see what it was like and saw 2 grandmas fist fighting over the new generation furby.
#30
Leaving a cabin in the Shenandoah mountains to make it to my Black Friday shift, a shift my boss had originally promised would go to someone else… then showing up to work and having my boss say “what do you know, we don’t even *need* you today!” So much worse than any customer interaction I can remember…
Image source: dreamshoes, Sean Foster
#31
Here’s the most extreme I’ve seen as a customer. My brother and I went last year and were in and out of walmart in 20 minutes at 6pm on thanksgiving. we made off with 2 tvs an ipad, and a couple of cheap hard drives. No camping out, no waiting in lines, no trampling people, no fighting traffic, and no stealing from other people.
Image source: simplesimon6262
#32
Not a cheese but I knew a girl who went shopping with her mom on black Friday and her mom accidentally left the girl there overnight so the girl went to the sporting goods section and slept in a tent.
Image source: PmButtPics4ADrawing, Nikola Đuza
#33
Two women got into a fistfight over $10 waffle irons in ’10.
Last year two men got into a fight in the parking lot. Over a shopping cart.
Image source: IDreamofLoki, reddit
#34
I’m working right now in a frozen yogurt shop in a mall. It’s 3:32 AM.
Some guy just paid for 10 dollars of yogurt and forgot it. Like straight up left.
More for me, I guess.
Image source: anon, Joshua Fernandez
#35
At the Walmart waiting in the horde for one of 11 sound bars they had this year. At 8 the plastic came off and the dude ahead of me went low for some reason. I saw one the bars I wanted kinda floating on top of the stack so a grabbed it and started backing out of the way. I saw the low dude in front of me get knocked in the head a few times. I’m not sure if he ended up getting one or not.
Image source: RobearNation, reddit
#36
This year would be my 4th Black Friday. Anyway, nothing extreme really happens. For the most part, customers are nice and understanding, they just want to be in and out of the store as quick as they can. The worst part is the anxiety I get mentally preparing for a 10 hour overnight. After about 3am, the traffic dies and you’re pretty much left to stand around, sleepy, for the rest of your shift. THAT is the worst part of it for me.
Image source: anon
#37
Watched a lady in an electric wheelchair accidentally run over a 6 year old. The little kid just walked it off while his mom was tripping. Old lady didn’t even mean to. Just a bunch of people and bad timing for the kid to run in the one open area.
Image source: OKCbigdog
#38
Best Buy, 2004. Washington State.
Made us work 11 hours shift without breaks.
All concrete floors, standing the whole time.
Image source: anon
#39
Target, two years ago. I just go to watch the gore- had a great vantage point. This family of yokels with like a dozen kids is right in front of me, way down the line- no way they are getting the big ticket items, right?
These kids were trained. They fanned out across the store, ducking and weaving. They located the tv specials hidden in the women’s clothing section and PHYSICALLY BLOCKED THE PILE until their parents got there with the cart. It was beautiful.
#40
For me: being the worker who closed! You come in and it was so busy the other workers didn’t clean up. I was in kids shoes, so tons of missing pairs.
Image source: randouser2019
#41
I sold firearms at a large outdoor store. When you call in a background check they ask how many records you are checking. My answer”I don’t know maybe 75″.
Image source: anon
#42
I used to work for walmart. Nothing extreme ever happened but I had to be the one to cut the wrap off of the movies and me and a coworker were stuck between two displays for fifteen minutes.
Image source: _Joxer_, oneyseal
#43
I had an old lady beat the hell out of a guy to the point we had to call the dude an ambulance. It was over a $5 coffee maker. I ended up selling her the coffee maker and an apology card. She gave it to me and asked me to get it to the guy and she dipped out. I kept the card as a memento.
Image source: hop378
#44
A rather large woman slammed my cart at checkout and proceeded to cut in front of me. I yelled at her for cutting and called her a bunch of fat insensitive names and made light of the fact that she had drenched her shirt in sweat despite the weather being well below freezing outside. I couldn’t do much else because putting my hands on her would have gotten me arrested.
It turns out she had changed the price tags on each expensive item she tried to buy. The cashier was having none of it and said she would have to put the items back. Of course the fat sow became indignant and demanded a manager. The manager came, with a police officer in tow and the ham planet was put in handcuffs on the spot. I checked out with no issues and with a wide grin on my face.
Image source: metela
#45
Black Friday of last year was my *first day* of working at Bath and Body Works. The amount of menopausal women that had an attitude with me while I was trying to help them check out was unreal.
Image source: thankyoujulie, Mr. Satterly
#46
Not a Black Friday story, but Christmas Eve. I used to work in a toy store in a mall. One Christmas, there was this insane demand for this one toy action figure. I mean absolutely insane. And some of his “pals” were also in stock, but everyone wanted the main toy.
Anyhow, as we stocked and counted down the minutes until we opened, people started to crowd outside the window. Some were pressing their faces against the glass and it was contorting their ugly mugs. Like dogs foaming at the mouth… it was already pandemonium and we hadn’t even opened.
The moment I raised the gate, I was trampled and people made a bee-line for this special toy. It looked like one was left, and this jacked white guy with an accent grabbed it, but then this angry looking black man in his post office work clothes grabbed it from his hands. The muscular guy proceeded to tackle him right in the middle of the store, and grabbed the toy back while the post office worker looked knocked out. Just as the buff guy walked to the checkout counter and paid for the toy, the other guy gathered his strength and crawled a few paces forward and swung his mail bag directly at this guy’s feet and literally swept his legs out from underneath him. I could not believe I was witnessing this right in this store.
The ripped fellow fell to the floor with a thud and the post office worker snatched the toy and began running out the toy store pushing people to and fro and running down the up-escalator. The man who lost the toy started to run out after him, pushing people as well causing a massive wake of destruction. I stood speechless, and in the fleeting moment I heard this man bellow “nooooooo turboooooomannnn” so loud that it drowned out the noise of all the incessant holiday chatter.
Image source: MobyDickTracyMorgan, Alex Robertson / Unsplash
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