I’ve worked retail for a few years now, and the most surprising thing about the job is that it’s absolutely nothing like what I’ve been told all my life to expect. We’ve all heard the clichés that customers are awful, coworkers are stupid, and that it destroys your faith in humanity (which is apparently pretty shallow, judging from the way people lose and restore it so frequently these days). After working about (but not quite) six months in a factory, I was looking forward to a job where I could openly talk to people without having to yell and that I would be forced to overcome my extreme social anxiety without the use of drugs or alcohol. On the other hand, I was ashamed to apply for such a position. I was a college student just trying to make it through the month. How did it come to this? What will people think of me? I’ll be one of those people, staring in a fixed gaze from across the counter, hardly capable of forming a complete sentence. On the other hand, my bank account wasn’t getting any richer. I can't speak for all people's history in the field, but I've noticed that some things aren't quite how they're made out to be.
The first thing that shocked me was that most people working retail (at least that I worked with) were either high school or college students, and quite a few of the managers and employees had degrees. These weren’t drugged-out zombies, but real people who had lives, families, and most importantly, conversations to pass the time with. The high school dropouts were nowhere to be seen (and if they were present, they disguised it well). You begin to realize that these entry-level jobs are mostly for people in their twenties in the fugue state between studentship and career. Lifers, as they’re called, either chose such a profession or managed to work their way up and have found good money in it.
Customers, on the other hand, are a more mixed breed. For the most part, though, they’ve been pleasant and ambivalent at the worst. I don’t think you’ll ever meet a retail worker whose never had a problem customer, or been yelled at by entitled elderly people, but that just comes with the territory. It seems as though, somehow, people are mostly good to each other. Even some of the most intimidating customers (The ones who walk in with a scowl and you just know they’re carrying the potential to get ugly, and I don’t mean “get ugly” as a sexual euphemism) can be defeated through kindness. Weird how that works. It’s one of the most basic clichés of treating others, but (like most clichés), it’s actually true. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve had the customers with outdated coupons and fabricated price matches that won’t back down and they’re the scum of the Earth, but they’re such a minority that you kinda forget about them. It’s an unfortunate case of “you get what you put in.”
Ultimately, I can’t say that I’d recommend a retail position for everybody. I’ve definitely seen some people come in and flounder, but it’s certainly not what you hear about it (at least not in my experience). At its worst, it’s better than McDonald’s.
