cashier: sorry for your wait. we’re short-staffed today
millennial: oh that’s ok no worries :)
baby boomer:
But listen that’s the thing.
We are short staffed almost 97% of the time at my retail job. Because corporate has figured out you can overwork 4 people at minimum wage instead of paying for the 8 people you should probably have to be on the clock.
Baby boomers grew up with stores that were adequately staffed, with workers who most likely had weeks of training for their jobs as opposed to the 1-2 shadow shift training we get now. Also those workers most likely were able to be full time if they wanted. Now retail, except for management positions, is mostly made up of part time workers, because you don’t have to give them benefits. So you have a workforce of perpetually underpaid, overwhelmed, undertrained people trying to do their best all while dealing with an entire generation of people who refuse to acknowledge that the system has changed and the average retail worker has NO control over that change and is being taken advantage of.
Like we got our customer surveys back, and almost every single one mentioned that they couldn’t find someone to help them or we needed more people on register because it was TOO SLOW, but what did management tell us instead of scheduling more people? We need to be quicker on register and call for backup if necessary. Which makes no sense because we can’t call for backup THAT ISN’T THERE.
Y'all my parents haven’t worked retail since the 70s and they absolutely never believe me about the things that happen at work. I explain the schedule for next week gets hung up on the Friday before and they scoff and go “well when i worked at X they had it a month up your manager is just lazy.” No mom, its company policy to only do “two weeks” in advance. They won’t give you a full month’s scheduling in advance cause it let’s you plan for a world outside of work.
Or about the hours, workload or anything. They just assume its an individual’s failing instead of corporate mandate. Or, if they do believe me (that its company policy) they call it ridiculous and point out some survey that argues its Good Business to do (insert decent thing here).As if they think the higher ups don’t know this and are simply ignorant of Good Business Practices. They don’t understand that retail has completely shifted from caring about its employees to squeezing out every penny now instead of investing it for later.
Cause that isn’t how it was when they worked and they just can’t seem to see otherwise.
I think there should be a ‘bring-your-parent-to-work-day’ instead of ‘bring-your-kid-to-work-day’, it would shock so many parents and would probably make them finally realize how much retail indeed has changed in the US.
when i first got hired as a cashier, my manager who had been doing that since she was like 17 in 1975 told me that back in The Days, when you were hired as a cashier in a grocery store it was a) a well paid job & you could get full time work easily b) a respected career choice c) the store closed at 6pm and was closed on Sundays so the hours were a lot more pleasant d) they made you go to cashier school for 2 weeks, which was basically a fake grocery store and you just learned the trade completely before even meeting a customer now its like : you get like 20 hours a week, bullshit shifts like 3:45 to 10:15, a 20 minutes training before being thrown to the wolves, customers tell you you deserve your shitty lowlife job as soon as you don’t thoroughly kiss their ass
The millennial experience is tied to growing income inequality and the indentured servitude of student loan debt
slytherin girls tapping their matte black nails impatiently on the desks, waiting for charms to be over so they can fix their roots, fiddling with the laces of their worn out combat boots, applying perfect winged eyeliner without even trying, scrawling their name in sharpies on the bottoms of their desks, wearing shorts in the dead of winter because they could, sending each other bad selfies in the middle of the night, perfecting the messy bun, dorms filled with old polariods and louboutins and old sweaters strewn everywhere
hufflepuff girls having kitchen raids at two in the morning, wearing ridiculously oversize yellow sweaters, using dry shampoo much too often, wearing the most glittery highlighters, perfecting curled ombre hair, using up whole packs of polaroid film at once, leaving nice notes on everyone’s bed, wearing ripped tights because why not, always laughing in the hallways, playing muggle music on old record players and dorms filled with all kinds of plants and cacti
gryffindor girls having the perfect dutch braids, all taking baths in the prefects bathroom at the same time, dancing in the rain, snapping their gum loudly, watching old films in the common room, perfecting the red lip, doing dares that seem stupid in the morning, playing muggle soccer on the quidditch pitch, group chats with every gryffindor girl, wearing red ponchos that are obnoxiously loud when you move, dorms draped in gold and covered in lights and always having enough snacks laying around
ravenclaw girls having study sessions and always writing the most beautiful notes, perfecting their sharp eyebrows, watching netflix when they’re supposed to be studying, making their own perfumes, running around in the hallways after curfew, having a flawless instagram feed, wearing tattered and ripped jeans, annotating books until they were covered in notes, brewing their own skin treatments, dorms filled with stacks of books and to do lists and covered in blue lights
