This article originally appeared on VICE Germany.
"Excuse me," I said, "only one person in the fitting room at a time, please." The teenage girl looked at me defiantly while her boyfriend turned bright red. She replied: "Are you just jealous because I have a boyfriend?"
A few hours later, another customer tore a dress from a hanger, demanding to know if we had it in any other sizes. After I told her we didn't, she dropped it on the floor and turned away to leave without saying another word. I asked her to please hang it back up and she responded, "That's where I found it."
Later that same day, a guy shouted at me for moving the bag he completely forgot on the floor. I tried explaining to him that someone could have stolen it if I hadn't taken it to lost and found, but he just screamed that he didn't need to be "lectured by a cashier."
Days like that were all too common in the four years I worked in retail, across two major fashion chains. But it doesn't seem to really make a difference whether you're selling clothes, coffee, condoms, broccoli, or vacuums—it's all the same. I hated it, and have since quit.
I recently caught up with two former colleagues—who now hate humanity as much as I do—so we could share our worst experiences working in retail. Anna and Miriam are still working in retail, so we've changed their names to protect their jobs. And my names isn't Juli—I had to sign a confidentiality agreement back when I worked for these horrible hellholes.
The Aggressive
Juli: I hated having to ask customers whether they wanted to pay for a bag, but we had no choice. A lot of people automatically said no, but would then give me a surprised look when I slid their purchase across the counter to them without a bag. That's exactly what happened with this guy who just stood in front of me angrily, wanting to know where he was meant to put his stuff. When I repeated that a bag costs 15 cents, it really wound him up. He threw a few pennies at my face and yelled, "Now give me the damn bag!" He'd gone too far, so I had to throw him out.
Anna: A little kid was screaming throughout the entire store. His mother just left him standing there screaming. She came back after ten minutes and smacked him. I called up to the office and asked if we should call the police. Unfortunately, she caught on and cleared out of the store.
Miriam: A customer left a fitting room a complete mess. I was feeling courageous so I asked her to please hang the items back up. She got really angry and said that I was only asking her to do it because she was black. I responded that her skin color was irrelevant, but she had already thrown a sweater at my face. Before I could even react, she had thrown everything from the fitting room at me and run off.
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