I Propose a Federal Mandate

The federal government of the United States of America should make it mandatory that every citizen works at least a year in the retail industry. The general public needs to be aware of the abuse and neglect that these employees experience. Not necessarily from their employer but, more often than not, from the customers they're supposed to serve.

I have a collected history of four years in retail. That's nothing compared to some veterans, but plenty of time to know to say please and thank you to the retail workers I interact with.

Of the four retail jobs I had, two of them were keyholders for clothing stores. One was a trendy store for contemporary women's fashions and the other was an upscale clothing store for women "of a certain age."

I was 18 and 20 at the times of working at these establishments. While I was too young to drink, I was not too young to be verbally abused by entitled women and, occasionally, their husbands. A husband once argued that a blouse that had been washed and ripped in the wash was just like an iPhone with a camera that had broken and needed to be replaced in kind. I said my hands were tied. He called the customer service number and berated the employee on the phone until they gave me the go-ahead to honor their return.

That's a lot of what happened. The unhappy customers wore us down so often that policy meant nothing. They won because they acted out and we were forced to smile and say thank you at the end of their transactions.

Maybe I was disassociating, but the day a worn and washed bralette was thrown at me because I wouldn't honor an out of date return policy, a character--Mallory--was born. I needed a healthy avenue to handle this customer's angry words being spit in my direction because she lost out on a $12.99 purchase.

She wouldn't leave until I gave her my full name. I gave her a fake name and she could tell. She yelled about it until another customer asked her to relax. The angry woman left in a huff and the customer who saved me got 10% off. I decided that Mallory would be the type to tell off a customer and not care if she was reprimanded by her manager.

It got to the point where I gave people 10% off if they were nice. My manager didn't like that because the district manager above her was noticing a drop in sales.

I guess if you're not getting it from below, you're getting it from above.

But there were perks. I got a 50% discount on all the clothes and first dibs on things that were going on sale. My coworkers were lovely women. I was able to overhear customers "of a certain age" talking about upcoming events. I was able to learn about a charity event and that helped me attend and meet some guys. Mallory benefitted from it as well for her storyline about snagging men "of a certain wallet size."

When working at the trendy shop, I got asked out by the cute Fed-Ex guy that delivered clothes on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. He asked me out on a Friday, we had a date on Saturday where I found out he was 12 years older than me and way too grabby for a first date. I coped with this by wondering "What Would Mallory Do?" I built up the courage to be ready to tell him off on Monday if he had a problem with it.

Monday rolled around and a new Fed-Ex guy was on our delivery route. At least Mallory got some writing material.

By the time I was finishing up a storyline for Mallory, it was also time for me to leave the second clothing store. I was hired into my next job: a home healthcare recruiter. Mallory's time in my mind had also taken a backseat. While I try to block out the memories of my retail experience, the existence of Mallory will stick with me for a while.

If you want to know more about Mallory, she exists in my first novel.

Until then, be nice to retail employees,

Katherine Arkady