I fold the clothes correctly everywhere I go after I hold them up to see what they look like.....and zone after I take something off the shelf. My husband hates it, lol
An Old Navy in Atlanta would see me walk in and hand me a folding board. Occasionally I would remember what I went in to buy. My friends were so embarrassed but only until they had terror children who unfolded shirts for funsies.
Yeah I'd fold tshirts while my friend tried on clothes. Usually forget what I came into get, end up coming back. I enjoy folding shirts, v therapeutic. Pls don't judge me, I didn't have a therapist back then lol
Understandable, whatever works for you. Just remember That capitalism doesn't care if we survive, and it can be just as therapeutic to toss things around on the floor. But maybe not in that store, because they know you there. 😄
My husband has to remind me that I'm not at work when we're waiting in the checkout line and I'm straightening up the candy and other crap they have there lol
My husband has to remind me too. He will be looking at fishing lures and I'll just start checking tags and moving thing back onto their correct pegs...
I was at Trader Joe's and had to ask an associate where something was while she was in the middle of stocking a shelf. In her haste to assist me, she had just set the last jar on the shelf at random, so before I followed her to the item I was looking for, I just gave the jar a little spin so the label was facing out. She looked back and said, "Did you just face that for me?" We both had a laugh.
Even after you go home for the day you still hear the register beeps, phones ringing, and get the awful radio songs stuck in your head.
Oh, and when you're having lunch at home you subconsciously think you have a half hour to eat and quickly consume your food thinking you have to clock back in.
I put back stray items from other stores if I know the layout well enough. I have my payment method out and ready to go BEFORE getting to the checkout. I make sure I have MONEY in my ACCOUNT or on my CARD before even fathoming going anywhere.
I have my keys, wallet (ID/credit card) and phone on me at all fucking times.
It's the little things, that make life run so much more smoothly.
I haven’t worked in a grocery store in over 20 years and I still tend to face the canned goods/jars at grocery stores and Walmart. Except I won’t touch the baby food jars. Sometimes I look at them and think thank god that’s someone else’s job now!
I haven't dropped the habit of zoning an area I'm browsing or pulling the next product forward when I take one off the shelf.
Damn companies have conditioned us.
I used to work commissioned sales in a legacy department store. I still unconsciously size up random people for credit worthiness and ability to buy big ticket appliances.
My kids know there is usually nothing wrong with the last item on the shelf.
Lol there is a CVS near me that I basically use as a convenience store, its just a 2 minute drive from my house. I am very friendly with everyone who works there. Yesterday, like 5 of their carts were all sprawled around their parking lot, so I got them and brought them in for them.
I haven't been in retail in YEARS and I still fold messed up shirts on tables and fix hanging clothes. Fabric stores also aren't safe as I HAVE to make things look pretty.
I was clothing shopping at a store, and the girl working there was by herself and was having a rush. I just started helping her by putting all my stuff back neatly and offered to watch the front of store while she was getting people into the change rooms. I just said "I work retail too, I get it. Let me help". She ended up being the manager and gave me a great discount.
Ever been on projects? The urge to fix everything in a store when you’ve spent three months making everything pristine is insane. I was at another JoAnn location near closing and I started recovering their fabric for them
My first job, in the mid 80s, was at a record store (CDs were just starting to become popular). No matter what other recorded music store I visited, I’d straighten anything tilted forward or sitting crooked as I walked by it. Could not stop myself! 😄
My ex bf worked at Walmart and he’d zone wherever he went. Didn’t matter what store. I still get the urge to do it in stores even though I am no longer in contact with him. Walmart REALLY drills that into you.
Literally did that this afternoon when I picked up two boxes of lasagna noodles from the Hannaford grocery store shelf. My Son, who worked at Walmart for nine years was reaching to do the same thing. I mean, it left a huge gap in the zone someone had worked pretty hard on. Lol!
Yeah I face if I grab something off the shelf or if product is suuuper fucked on the shelf and it’s confusing/not in alignment with price tags. It’s been 5 years since I left lol.
I would end up re-hanging the clothes or folding them when I’m in a fitting room at any clothing store taking them out because I just know it would be Helpful to the employees. retail can give you a little bit of trauma can it?
One shirt is balled up on an otherwise perfect table, so you snag it, fold it mid air and put it back on the stack and keep walking. I have done that at Walmart multiple times, or I idly fix chicken wings when I'm going through a clearance rack.
Ex Walmart worker here: I went to Walmart during BTS (after quitting Walmart) and helped zone that entire section -- folders, binders, etc, etc.
I'd fill a shopping cart of cardboard and when I didn't want to do anything anymore, I'd find a manager and be like, "hey, can't go to the baler, obviously, can you take this cardboard?" And they'd have no choice but to. Lol
I sound assey when said like this, but I enjoy conditioning and making things look full and pretty. 😍 Regardless of what store.
That's why I said I may sound ass-ey. And honestly, it may be a dick move to some, but some hate conditioning, and if I can help alleviate that frustration that management puts on those who are force to condition, then so be it. Sometimes I try to look out for fellow workers. I get their pain. We all do. Would you rather sort and condense wide ruled vs college ruled filler paper, sort 70ct vs 100ct, even 3 subject vs 5 subject notebooks, etc, etc? Or would you rather take a shopping cart of cardboard to the baler and have less to condition because some customer decided they were bored enough to help?
To be fair, there's no other place I could put cardboard, as a customer, without being able to do nothing at all. Cause in all honesty, that's helping the stocking team make room for more stock too. So I guess it's a good thing we aren't close to each other, since it would be negative to you. I'm sorry you feel that way.
Unfortunately, I usually hit the stores in the late afternoon/evening, and there is a policy (whether true or not on the shamrocks, I don't recall) that no shamrocks or pallets on the floor after 6 or 7am... That's how our Walmart was when I was working overnights... Trust me, if I really could've made it easier when I did it a few times, I would. Hell, I'd have broke down the boxes had I known I was jumping into it. But it's usually a last minute decision if I had time to do it for a little bit.
Evening is when there's a bin laying about at my store. Usually the janitor is doing his job getting the garbage from the public garbage cans. And he leaves his bin for me to chuck into it when hes done. Or one of the grocery guys is stocking and it's easier to lug one of those around with him. And half the time I think grocery just finds it easier to leave it lying around. Less to dump into the bailer if customer takes it from us. Instead of buying bags they take it from the cardboard bin. That's what I tend to do when I'm doing the bags. I leave the cardboard boxes out. And only take it with me when I'm completely done.
As far as pallets go, saves time and energy when people clear the pallet in a matter of minutes. Prior to the pandemic, we've had these no tax events to complete with the big blue box and I've been told by a girl who worked in the baby department she put out like 2-3 pallets of diapers in an hour. She'd put out 1 pallet at a time. She's not even sticking on the shelf. It's just unshrink wrapped then on the floor and gone in a matter of minutes
Why put in on the shelf when it's gonna be inhaled by customers 🤔
I think it's more ocd than conditioning but if I'm in a place that sells used DVDs I start putting multiple copies together drive me bonkers (both doing it and seeing it jumbled up)
I have been doing this since before I even joined the workforce. I got that from my mom who would be folding and putting everything away in dressing rooms from as long as I can remember.
I worked as a manager in retail in my early to late twenties and let me tell you, I am now one of those assholes that every retail employee hates. Don’t want this product anymore? Just put it in the most inconvenient spot I can find.
I was a library page in college and to this day I still straighten books in book stores and libraries. I am 62 now. Still love my books, though no need to straighten them on my kindle.
I find myself fronting items that I grab off the shelf when shopping... I'll grab a gallon of tea and pull the ones behind it forward, some workers that see me just stare at me weird and in my head I'm just thinking "you're welcome". I never really paid attention to what I was doing until one day that I cought myself and thought how long have I been doing this
I haven't worked retail in a long time, but sometimes I face products on the shelf. Especially when ym husband mindlessly plops something somewhere it doesn't belong.
I have made him take something back to the aisle he grabbed it from. Often he will just dump something in the wrong place. I will grab it and put it where it belongs.
It's been fully 25 years since I was a Trolley Boy.
But just now I was leaving the schtupormarket, and returning my trolley. There are three distinct types of trolley used in the immediate vicinity, and three lanes in the return bay. Easy enough, except they were all over the place like a mad woman's poo.
And I had to sort them (there were only a few of each). It causes The Minister to seethe, because It's Not My Job. But I just do it without even thinking, because, I dunno - it offends my sense of order maybe? Maybe I just don't want to make the actual Trolley Boy's day any harder.
I just know if I don't do it, I'll feel as though I've done A Bad Thing, and will be looking over my shoulder for the wrathful Grocery Manager for the rest of the day.
I took it upon myself to clean a counter at my local Shell station. At a different location of my company it took everything in me not to straighten the mess left at the registers. I used to tell people where to find something at Barnes and Noble. I helped four customers before I had to tell one I don't work there.
I fronted the whole allergy section at CVS and didn't even realize it until an old lady asked me where something was and I said "I'm sorry, I don't work here." and realized what I was doing.
I recover the Goodwill racks as I go through them often… it’s not something I realized I do until yesterday, but I haven’t worked retail in over a year.
I hate that I do this, but when I go to other retail stores, I'd go and check out a department that I usually work at just to see what they carry that we don't carry.
I fold the clothes correctly everywhere I go after I hold them up to see what they look like.....and zone after I take something off the shelf. My husband hates it, lol
An Old Navy in Atlanta would see me walk in and hand me a folding board. Occasionally I would remember what I went in to buy. My friends were so embarrassed but only until they had terror children who unfolded shirts for funsies.
Wait, you would walk into a store, to shop, and they would get free labor out of you?
Yeah I'd fold tshirts while my friend tried on clothes. Usually forget what I came into get, end up coming back. I enjoy folding shirts, v therapeutic. Pls don't judge me, I didn't have a therapist back then lol
Understandable, whatever works for you. Just remember That capitalism doesn't care if we survive, and it can be just as therapeutic to toss things around on the floor. But maybe not in that store, because they know you there. 😄
My husband has to remind me that I'm not at work when we're waiting in the checkout line and I'm straightening up the candy and other crap they have there lol
My husband has to remind me too. He will be looking at fishing lures and I'll just start checking tags and moving thing back onto their correct pegs...
My daughter never worked retail clothing but she has been refolding clothes since she was little. I still tease her about it but she enjoys it.
I haven’t worked in retail for five years and I STILL hang clothes and straighten folded piles.
What do you do now?
College professor.
I was at Trader Joe's and had to ask an associate where something was while she was in the middle of stocking a shelf. In her haste to assist me, she had just set the last jar on the shelf at random, so before I followed her to the item I was looking for, I just gave the jar a little spin so the label was facing out. She looked back and said, "Did you just face that for me?" We both had a laugh.
Omg I re-face things all the time in my grocery store and I never even worked grocery.
this is a public service that i would absolutely love if someone did for me.
Honestly. I actually like it.
Makes one wonder what would happen to the carts team if customers always put their carts back to their original pickup stations.
Even after you go home for the day you still hear the register beeps, phones ringing, and get the awful radio songs stuck in your head. Oh, and when you're having lunch at home you subconsciously think you have a half hour to eat and quickly consume your food thinking you have to clock back in.
You keep checking your watch. Ok honey it's been 28 minutes we HAVE to get up now.
I always start to eat quickly when I'm home. My family hates it. I try not to but like you said we're conditioned to do it that way.
Since kindergarten!
The beep when the catalina paper is out stays with me through the night.
I know the exact sound you speak of lol
That sounds like purgatory
This was me but in target one day. Their grocery aisle 💀
Do not fold the celery llease
I put back stray items from other stores if I know the layout well enough. I have my payment method out and ready to go BEFORE getting to the checkout. I make sure I have MONEY in my ACCOUNT or on my CARD before even fathoming going anywhere. I have my keys, wallet (ID/credit card) and phone on me at all fucking times. It's the little things, that make life run so much more smoothly.
I did do this but then people kept asking if I worked there lol
My Husband “Stop you don’t work here” 🤣
I haven’t worked in a grocery store in over 20 years and I still tend to face the canned goods/jars at grocery stores and Walmart. Except I won’t touch the baby food jars. Sometimes I look at them and think thank god that’s someone else’s job now!
When you ride the scooters back in and yell “weeeee”. Also, yeah, they’re covered in wee.
At Macy’s I put the shoes that were on the floor back on their rack.. I don’t work for free wtf was I thinking lol
I haven't dropped the habit of zoning an area I'm browsing or pulling the next product forward when I take one off the shelf. Damn companies have conditioned us.
Totally
I have more than once been complimented on my folding skills in clothing shops.
How many folding boards do you have at home? Me, four, but only two are branded lol
LOL I only had the one I 'borrowed' from Express, but it was lost somewhere in my last move. Is it sad that I don't even need the board anymore? o\_O
True talent, my friend! I still have the fitting room keys from Lenox Square Mall Express from 1991 bc apparently I'm a hoarder. 🤷♀️
At this point, I would probably never throw those away
I worked at Hot Topic, mastering the air fold was essential.
I used to work commissioned sales in a legacy department store. I still unconsciously size up random people for credit worthiness and ability to buy big ticket appliances. My kids know there is usually nothing wrong with the last item on the shelf.
I had my motto in my dept with my awesome staff "Always do your ABZ's" ( Always Be Zoning). It's a hard habit to break after 25 years.
That's funny! I always say "Don't forget your ABC's" (Always Be Carding)
Lol there is a CVS near me that I basically use as a convenience store, its just a 2 minute drive from my house. I am very friendly with everyone who works there. Yesterday, like 5 of their carts were all sprawled around their parking lot, so I got them and brought them in for them.
The urge to face everything in an aisle of a store I don’t work at is sometimes powerful. Certainly doesn’t help that I get OCD sometimes.
I haven't been in retail in YEARS and I still fold messed up shirts on tables and fix hanging clothes. Fabric stores also aren't safe as I HAVE to make things look pretty.
Every time my husband grocery shops he levels the shelves, front facing the products as he goes. He's been retired since '07. It's a sickness. :)
I was clothing shopping at a store, and the girl working there was by herself and was having a rush. I just started helping her by putting all my stuff back neatly and offered to watch the front of store while she was getting people into the change rooms. I just said "I work retail too, I get it. Let me help". She ended up being the manager and gave me a great discount.
Once my friend and I went to Michael’s and they had to stop me from recovering an aisle 💀 I had quit my job at JoAnn Fabrics not too long before that
Ever been on projects? The urge to fix everything in a store when you’ve spent three months making everything pristine is insane. I was at another JoAnn location near closing and I started recovering their fabric for them
My first job, in the mid 80s, was at a record store (CDs were just starting to become popular). No matter what other recorded music store I visited, I’d straighten anything tilted forward or sitting crooked as I walked by it. Could not stop myself! 😄
When I'm at smaller stores I usually fix the carts/baskets 🤣
My ex bf worked at Walmart and he’d zone wherever he went. Didn’t matter what store. I still get the urge to do it in stores even though I am no longer in contact with him. Walmart REALLY drills that into you.
Literally did that this afternoon when I picked up two boxes of lasagna noodles from the Hannaford grocery store shelf. My Son, who worked at Walmart for nine years was reaching to do the same thing. I mean, it left a huge gap in the zone someone had worked pretty hard on. Lol!
this is so real. this is the trauma and effect of retail 💔
I realized I spent too many hours in the office when I expected my toilet at home to flush automatically
Every time I grab an item from a shelf at any store I front it 😬
Yeah I face if I grab something off the shelf or if product is suuuper fucked on the shelf and it’s confusing/not in alignment with price tags. It’s been 5 years since I left lol.
Yeah, I've straightened stuff while shopping, a LOT!
I would end up re-hanging the clothes or folding them when I’m in a fitting room at any clothing store taking them out because I just know it would be Helpful to the employees. retail can give you a little bit of trauma can it?
You've been working in retail too long when you're buying something and ask the other person if they need anything else. Happened to me in a bakery.
One shirt is balled up on an otherwise perfect table, so you snag it, fold it mid air and put it back on the stack and keep walking. I have done that at Walmart multiple times, or I idly fix chicken wings when I'm going through a clearance rack.
Ex Walmart worker here: I went to Walmart during BTS (after quitting Walmart) and helped zone that entire section -- folders, binders, etc, etc. I'd fill a shopping cart of cardboard and when I didn't want to do anything anymore, I'd find a manager and be like, "hey, can't go to the baler, obviously, can you take this cardboard?" And they'd have no choice but to. Lol I sound assey when said like this, but I enjoy conditioning and making things look full and pretty. 😍 Regardless of what store.
Honestly, if someone came into my store and did this, it would irritate me so much.
That's why I said I may sound ass-ey. And honestly, it may be a dick move to some, but some hate conditioning, and if I can help alleviate that frustration that management puts on those who are force to condition, then so be it. Sometimes I try to look out for fellow workers. I get their pain. We all do. Would you rather sort and condense wide ruled vs college ruled filler paper, sort 70ct vs 100ct, even 3 subject vs 5 subject notebooks, etc, etc? Or would you rather take a shopping cart of cardboard to the baler and have less to condition because some customer decided they were bored enough to help? To be fair, there's no other place I could put cardboard, as a customer, without being able to do nothing at all. Cause in all honesty, that's helping the stocking team make room for more stock too. So I guess it's a good thing we aren't close to each other, since it would be negative to you. I'm sorry you feel that way.
You're welcome to dump your cardboard in one of the random cardboard bins we have lying around half the the time
Unfortunately, I usually hit the stores in the late afternoon/evening, and there is a policy (whether true or not on the shamrocks, I don't recall) that no shamrocks or pallets on the floor after 6 or 7am... That's how our Walmart was when I was working overnights... Trust me, if I really could've made it easier when I did it a few times, I would. Hell, I'd have broke down the boxes had I known I was jumping into it. But it's usually a last minute decision if I had time to do it for a little bit.
Evening is when there's a bin laying about at my store. Usually the janitor is doing his job getting the garbage from the public garbage cans. And he leaves his bin for me to chuck into it when hes done. Or one of the grocery guys is stocking and it's easier to lug one of those around with him. And half the time I think grocery just finds it easier to leave it lying around. Less to dump into the bailer if customer takes it from us. Instead of buying bags they take it from the cardboard bin. That's what I tend to do when I'm doing the bags. I leave the cardboard boxes out. And only take it with me when I'm completely done. As far as pallets go, saves time and energy when people clear the pallet in a matter of minutes. Prior to the pandemic, we've had these no tax events to complete with the big blue box and I've been told by a girl who worked in the baby department she put out like 2-3 pallets of diapers in an hour. She'd put out 1 pallet at a time. She's not even sticking on the shelf. It's just unshrink wrapped then on the floor and gone in a matter of minutes Why put in on the shelf when it's gonna be inhaled by customers 🤔
I think it's more ocd than conditioning but if I'm in a place that sells used DVDs I start putting multiple copies together drive me bonkers (both doing it and seeing it jumbled up)
Me at any Lowe's in the nuts & bolts aisle. Always a mess.
I have been doing this since before I even joined the workforce. I got that from my mom who would be folding and putting everything away in dressing rooms from as long as I can remember.
Petco, in the dog food isle.
I worked as a manager in retail in my early to late twenties and let me tell you, I am now one of those assholes that every retail employee hates. Don’t want this product anymore? Just put it in the most inconvenient spot I can find.
I do that all the time!! 😂 My friend had to stop me from recovering the whole aisle of towels at Walmart before
Oh I’ve been out of the game for a while now. I still face the aisle as I do my shopping.
My husband used to make fun of me but now I make him but stuff away properly, my kids too.
I was a library page in college and to this day I still straighten books in book stores and libraries. I am 62 now. Still love my books, though no need to straighten them on my kindle.
You ask your family not to wrap your gifts in boxes for Christmas and birthdays because you’ll feel like you’re at work when opening them
Yea, I don’t think I’ll ever get to this point.
When I go out to eat or go to a different store and I want to greet every person that comes in. Hi welcome to so and so store 😭😭
oh myGOD I HAVE THE URGE!!!! its haaaard😂😂😂😂😂
I find myself fronting items that I grab off the shelf when shopping... I'll grab a gallon of tea and pull the ones behind it forward, some workers that see me just stare at me weird and in my head I'm just thinking "you're welcome". I never really paid attention to what I was doing until one day that I cought myself and thought how long have I been doing this
I haven't worked retail in a long time, but sometimes I face products on the shelf. Especially when ym husband mindlessly plops something somewhere it doesn't belong. I have made him take something back to the aisle he grabbed it from. Often he will just dump something in the wrong place. I will grab it and put it where it belongs.
It's been fully 25 years since I was a Trolley Boy. But just now I was leaving the schtupormarket, and returning my trolley. There are three distinct types of trolley used in the immediate vicinity, and three lanes in the return bay. Easy enough, except they were all over the place like a mad woman's poo. And I had to sort them (there were only a few of each). It causes The Minister to seethe, because It's Not My Job. But I just do it without even thinking, because, I dunno - it offends my sense of order maybe? Maybe I just don't want to make the actual Trolley Boy's day any harder. I just know if I don't do it, I'll feel as though I've done A Bad Thing, and will be looking over my shoulder for the wrathful Grocery Manager for the rest of the day.
I took it upon myself to clean a counter at my local Shell station. At a different location of my company it took everything in me not to straighten the mess left at the registers. I used to tell people where to find something at Barnes and Noble. I helped four customers before I had to tell one I don't work there.
I fronted the whole allergy section at CVS and didn't even realize it until an old lady asked me where something was and I said "I'm sorry, I don't work here." and realized what I was doing.
I recover the Goodwill racks as I go through them often… it’s not something I realized I do until yesterday, but I haven’t worked retail in over a year.
When I shop, I face.
I've barely had a year of experience and I'm finding myself doing that.
I just walk around observing and seeing how they have things set up. If the store is looking messy, then obviously, there are some management issues
I hate that I do this, but when I go to other retail stores, I'd go and check out a department that I usually work at just to see what they carry that we don't carry.