Stupid things customers ask on Xmas Eve Eve

Also did a few years in a well known supermarket. Every year I 'ruined' quite a few christmas days apparently. No turkeys at 3.30pm, the year we closed at 4pm. As we left the store that year people were arriving in their cars and swore at us that we needed to open the doors back up for them as they needed to shop.

It was actually frightening some years, people stealing out of other trolleys. Proper punching each other, police being called.

I write this every year but about 25 years ago, in Asda, 30 minutes before closing, looking for reductions (!), a woman in the fruit and vegetable section was screaming abuse at one of the staff Why are there no fresh sprouts, don't you know it's Christmas???? Lots of people giggling, probably wanting to break into song.

Especially when the shop is crowded, it is a lot quicker to ask someone than go up and down the aisles, particularly with eggs, which, as established, are kept in a different place in every supermarket! God forbid a staff member has to quickly say 'aisle 3' or whatever

They generally do.

Search for the item. It will tell you the aisle if you click on 'shelf'. I do this in Tesco and Sainsbury's most. I'm fairly familiar with Asda.

This does not work with eggs.

Have you read the thread? Do you really need it spelling out to you?

I was a 'shop girl' who became a CEO . Final PAYE salary £500k.

In my town there are 100 applicants for a basic retail job.
My favourite job? As a Estee Lauder sales consultant in a Grace Brothers type store in the south.

Husband used to work in a bookshop, and a flustered customer came in asking if they sold toothbrushes.

He said there were always men coming in shortly before closing on Christmas Eve in a panic that they hadn't done their shopping. He used to 'recommend' any of the old stock they'd had trouble shifting, and they'd usually buy it!

I do the free sampling in a supermarket and have done for a number of years It seems I am the local agony aunt as customers like to prop up my stand and tell me their woes ….. this year has been the worst for complainers ….

Really? Which law says I can’t? Sure I couldn’t have called the cops if they’d had refused. But if they had done then we’d have banned them from the store.

As a student I was working in argos the year telly tubbies came out. I was shouted at and sworn at, accused of keeping toys for myself. It was vile.

We put up signs saying no telly tubbies but people didn't care, they became savages !
Even worse this was before the computer told you when to go to the collection point. As soon as people payed they started pushing at the collection counter, place would be heaving.

When I worked for a certain catalogue retail store, people coming in at 4pm Christmas Eve wanting that years must have toy. When told we didn’t have any left, and hadn’t for weeks kicking off and saying how can they tell their child Santa didn’t have the toy they had been asking for!

I worked retail in a toy store and obviously the most popular toy that year would sell out way before Christmas Eve. You’d still get customers at 3pm Christmas Eve shouting at you (a minimum wage earner) that you had ruined their child’s Christmas because an hour before end of play on Christmas Eve we no longer had stock of that year’s most in-demand toy.

My bugbear is Marmite, I can never find it in shops. Eggs no problem though.

I used to work in public libraries, open some years until 8pm Christmas and New Years Eve. People would float along and try and get in at 7.55pm wanting to choose books 'for the holiday period'. Our 'boss' used to stand by the front doors and take the books off people then send them off with a flea in their ear. She was small but very fierce, no one argued with her

Not a customer one but in a similar vein, why is it that every single year multiple people ask on the community Facebook page what bin is going out when? Not only is that info easily available on the council website, unless your bin day is Christmas Day or Boxing Day, IT WILL BE THE SAME AS USUAL.

The I work in a small supermarket (think Express) and I get asked several times a shift for eggs. I happily take the customer to them but some of them have only just come through the door and haven’t even looked in our six aisles 😂

I was pondering when doing my final shop this morning, how useful it would be if supermarkets had an App you could download with a search facility to tell you where specific products were shelved.

Yeah, I imagine the OP would be the first one to complain if all the students/graduates working in retail (temporarily while studying or looking for another job, or permanently, as I've said above it can be an excellent career) decided they were too good to do so and claimed benefits instead, and the shops were unable to function.

Not to mention all the many people who have spent decades doing other jobs and then took on part time retail work to supplement their retirement.

I agree, egg placement is highly variable from shop to shop!

I work in a Supermarket and don’t know that about bread so I really wouldn’t expect a customer to know! I’m so glad you didn’t work in my local supermarket with your unhelpful attitude.

I don’t buy crackers until late because they are a pain to store. I have some sale ones in the cupboard and they always end up a bit crushed.

I’ve had that one ten minutes before closing at 10.50pm on Christmas Eve lol

I see your supermarket eggs and raise you my local Lidl: with the tinned fish in the same aisle as the wine and beer.

Interesting arguments on here about Crackers.
I worked in retail for several years, the majority of our non-perishable Christmas stock did indeed arrive in September. Crackers had a very unusual sales pattern, very few boxes would be sold until December, with well-over 75% not selling until the final week before Christmas. Many customers also wait until they are reduced in the final few days, because they are pretty expensive, and the mark-up is high. I suspect the pricing algorithms are set to still enable profitability with a 50% reduction in price.
So it really isn’t unusual for customers to buy crackers on Christmas Eve. Anyone working in retail would certainly be aware of this buying pattern.

@SpiritVaults nasty - plenty of graduates working in supermarkets as they can't get work in their chosen field (my daughter included, who hates being treated as an extension of the self scan tills and not as an intelligent, sentient being.) She has bills to pay sadly, so there she is...