Abba Dabba Don’t | Sorry for ruining your Christmas | Forever in Blue Jeans
The Ghost of Tickle-Me Elmo
The first rule of holiday shopping fight club is… well, there don’t seem to be any rules when the Christmas Crunch turns Any random trip to the freezer aisle into an excuse to throw down
BY BRANDON JOHANSSON
Fisticuffs between holiday shoppers aren’t limited to the toy aisle. Sure, when we picture those especially nutty shoppers who are willing to put hands on another shopper, we tend to assume it started over some must-have toy that they simply wouldn’t be denied.
But when thinking about that particular holiday horror-story scenario — and, really, any of the terrible moments retail employees have to endure between Thanksgiving and New Years — don’t overlook the combat zones that can erupt in a grocery store produce section. Or the frozen food aisle. And the checkout counter, too, as well as the bakery, deli, restrooms, bread aisle and, of course, the parking lot.
With holiday revelers already stressed about their gift shopping, getting the perfect Christmas dinner ready can be the compound nightmare that sends their holiday season into a very dark place.
“Fights in the parking lot are not out of the ordinary,” says J, who works at a grocery store adjacent to a ritzy local mall.
With drivers trying to squeeze their Range Rovers into a parking lot often packed to the gills with other holiday shoppers, J says motorists regularly spat with one another. And those spats don’t suddenly cease when the motorists turn into shoppers.
It’s tough to recall specific instances of customers acting like savages in the aisles — but that’s probably because there have been so many screaming, entitled customers that they all run together after a while.
One holiday season, J had to get between two shoppers in the produce section who apparently thought the area near the kumquats and cucumbers was an appropriate venue to settle their differences. It wasn’t.
“It’s kind of sad to see that side of humanity, but it’s definitely a real thing,” J says.
Beyond that almost-rumble in the produce section, J says it’s tough to recall specific instances of customers acting like savages in the aisles — but that’s probably because there have been so many screaming, entitled customers that they all run together after a while.
“It might be just ‘cause there have been so many,” he says.
It doesn’t have to be that way, though. Many grocery stores, including J’s, offer a delivery service that is pretty affordable. It’s especially affordable when you consider what it’s worth to you not to wait in line, not to have to battle for a parking spot, and to not have to worry about breaking out your MMA skills somewhere near the last carton of heavy whipping cream.
Especially around the holidays, when customers are already stressed to the maximum with other shopping issues, J says paying the extra few bucks to have your groceries dropped at your door step is well worth it.
If shoppers have to come into the store, J says he hopes they just remember some of the inherent challenges grocery and other retail workers face — challenges that don’t have to do with grumpy customers or the busiest time of the year.
For one, retail means pretty lousy hours. The staff that’s getting harangued by someone who just can’t find that specific ham glaze is probably working in the evening, when they’d rather be home with their family. Or they are working on a weekend, missing out on countless good times so people can get the groceries they need. Holidays are often workdays, too. And once the customers are gone, there is often plenty of work left — that means the workers don’t get to go home until well after closing.
“It’s not 9 to 5 hours, especially in a grocery store. A lot of people just don’t realize that,” J says.
But, J says, he doesn’t expect those rude shoppers will suddenly kick the habit and stop venting their holiday rage on the first person they see with a name tag. The shopper rage will probably happen more than a few times this holiday season, too.
“It’s Christmas, that’s how it is,” he says. “Everybody gets crazy.”
The Ghost of Tickle-Me Elmo | Sorry for ruining your Christmas | Forever in Blue Jeans
Abba Dabba Don’t
IKEA is a magical place filled with great products, tasty meatballs, and herds of shoppers who can make what should be the BESTÅ time of the year into the HOVSKÄR-iest
BY QUINCY SNOWDON
Most American shoppers probably know Ikea best for its delectable meatballs and bedeviling futon assembly. Well, that and the disgustingly endearing scene from 2009’s “500 Days of Summer.”
But there’s more to the Swedish retail powerhouse than an overwhelming assortment of bargain decor and protein spheres drowning in puddles of gravy. The blue and gold mecca of home goods has a weird, wail-inducing and sometimes even wonderful underbelly that, like at so many other retail establishments, is exposed in an astonishingly hypnotizing way every November and December. At least, that’s according to C, who has embraced her inner Swede for more than four years at Colorado’s only Ikea in Centennial — a place where she’s had more than her share of questionable, meatball-flavored encounters.
“It’s crazy how much time people spend there,” C says. “I’ve seen people go in for breakfast, drop their kids off, then they shop, then they pick their kids up, then they have dinner stuff with them…it’s a whole day.”
She believes that undying, day-wasting love many customers feel for the venerable furniture emporium is due in no small part to Småland, Ikea’s free childcare center and something of a free babysitting service for droves of penny-pinching parents. Both The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal have written about cash-strapped moms and dads who use Småland as a means of achieving a brief, free date, albeit one that takes place in a looming human rat maze filled with an endless sea of unattainable dinette sets. A regular overseer of Småland, C says the service, which is only offered for one-hour windows of time, often becomes a point of contention during the uber-stressful holiday season.
“A lot of people really, really want to shop without their kids, but once we’re full, we’re full and you have to wait until the other kids leave,” she says. “So then I’ll hear, ‘What do you mean you’re full and you can’t watch my kid?’ There are plenty of people who I think shouldn’t have kids at all.”
But for the fortunate, bleary-eyed moms and dads who are able to earn a temporary respite from a snot-covered Junior, there is certainly no lack of items to peruse, with more than 12,000 items in most stores worldwide, according to the company’s website. But such an overload of wares can lead some customers to become as disoriented as Charlie Bucket during Mr. Wonka’s hallucinogenic boat ride — especially during the holidays.
C says that she regularly has customers who break down in tears due to compounding disorientation, a lack of natural sunlight and an inability to read the myriad signs leading to designated exit areas.
“People have panic attacks where they’re bawling, crying because they can’t get out of the store,” she says. “I usually say something like, ‘Calm down, breathe, okay, are you buying anything?’ I kind of feel like a therapist.”
In an effort to avoid that catastrophic moment of self-doubt, C suggests that customers a.) Be able to read, as the store is littered with signs and b.) Know what they’re looking for.
The store is manageable with a plan, but quickly becomes a hellish labyrinth of spite when coupled with nebulous organization.
“It’s mostly like a do-it-yourself store, so you really should know how to shop before you come,” C says. “I don’t know if there’s a YouTube video for how to shop at Ikea, but they should make one. If you don’t know what you’re looking for, you’ll be in there forever.”
Entering the web without a plan often leads to gross over-purchasing, according to C, who says she regularly bears witness to purchases that may seem smart in August, but make for an odd sight under the Christmas tree.
“I think a lot of people try to get their Christmas shopping out of the way, but then they bring it all back because they find something better,” she says. “People see things and then think, ‘Okay, I’ll buy a bunch of these for everybody in my family.’ To which I ask, ‘Are you sure you want 50 pairs of slippers?’”
But for all of the crying, commotion and general chaos shoppers induce each holiday season, C says she does see some enchanting examples of humanity amid situations that can elicit many people’s inner Grinch.
She says that instead of watching venomous suburban moms mercilessly jockey for the best position in line, she’s seen customers make purchases for one another, especially throughout December.
“This one guy bought about $100 worth of stuff for the person behind him,” she says. “I think they were talking and he thought she was a good person so he bought her stuff for her — I thought that was very cool.”
The Ghost of Tickle-Me Elmo | Abba Dabba Don’t | Forever in Blue Jeans
Sorry for ruining your Christmas
When that must-have gift can’t be found, remember who’s really to blame
BY BRANDON JOHANSSON
There are plenty of ways to wreck Christmas.
Maybe steal someone’s tree like the Grinch? That would be a bummer. You could snatch the stockings, too.
Or an especially crappy boss could fire someone on Dec. 23, or just withhold their Christmas bonus like in “National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation.” Getting canned or not having enough cash around the holiday would certainly dampen the holiday spirit.
And, apparently, a store’s lack of seasonal snacks can nuke the holiday, too.
“This lady told us that we ruined Christmas because we didn’t have these white cheesy poofs,” says M, a longtime retail worker who logged several holiday seasons at a store near a certain upscale Colorado mall and other retailers.
The store only stocked these particular cheesy poofs around the holidays, and they were popular enough that when this shopper rolled in on Dec. 23 — the day before Christmas Eve and well past the shopping season’s two-minute warning — the poofs had gone, well, poof.
M doesn’t remember details about this specific customer — other than the fact that one of her Christmases was supposedly decimated by a lack of novelty dairy product. But she remembers she seemed like a great many of the shoppers at high-end malls: frustrated and entitled.
Even though there were less than 48 hours remaining before Saint Nick descended the chimney, this shopper was livid that the store hadn’t kept the store shelves adequately loaded with even the rarest of seasonal items.
But if she was looking to get a rise out of some overworked, underpaid and simply over-the-holiday-season retail workers, she was sorely disappointed.
“I said, ‘I’m sorry I ruined your Christmas,’” M says, and with that she left the customer to go about her shopping.
That shopper with the paper-thin handle on what makes the holidays special had committed one of the cardinal sins of holiday shopping: She waited until just a couple days before Christmas to shop. It’s not just that shelves could be bare by then, but you know workers are at their wit’s end from a shopping season that now starts on Thanksgiving Day. And you can count on your fellow shoppers being something less than cheerful as they try to wrap everything up at the last minute.
Then she was a jerk about it. That’s one of the easiest things for shoppers to avoid, M says. They can shop a bit earlier when they know things will be in stock, and when they can count on a better selection and hopefully workers whose nerves haven’t been fried just yet. But what’s even worse than the late shoppers? Thanksgiving shoppers. Black Friday is one thing, but patronizing stores that force employees to skip out on a family holiday like Thanksgiving just to let people who sacrifice their own family time to save a few bucks on a gadget is just mean, M says.
The best bet is to get your shopping done in the few weeks after Thanksgiving. And while you do it, M says it’s always a good idea to try to put yourself in the retail workers’ shoes. Imagine the longer hours with what often amounts to a skeleton crew of workers. And imagine being so stressed and busy you often forget to take your lunch, let alone the occasional 15-minute break. And imagine all the stress you feel having to shop for your family and friends, and compound that with the fact that you also have to spend your working hours in same zoo of a shopping mall.
“You don’t want to be treated badly,” M says.
The Ghost of Tickle-Me Elmo | Abba Dabba Don’t | Sorry for ruining your Christmas
Forever in Blue Jeans
Something about comfy denim bottoms turns your average mall-dweller into insomniacs in search of holiday deals
BY RACHEL SAPIN
December not only brings holiday cheer, but lots and lots of it, says K, a Levi jeans specialist at the metro-area Macy’s where he has worked for a year.
“You hear ‘Jingle Bells’ 10 times a day,” says K, who works in the Macy’s men’s department, when asked what is one of the worst parts of working in retail from November through December. “Sometimes we close at midnight and people are still shopping here.
I ask, ‘Do these people have a life?’ We just keep telling them that we’ll be closing in five minutes. But they still ask, ‘Can I keep shopping?’”
He says it’s really hard to convince people to leave the store during the midnight holiday sales. Like on Black Fridays, when they barge in during the wee hours of the morning, bleary-eyed.
“They say they’ve been awake all night,” K explains. “Did I tell you to shop at 1 a.m.?” He says the way you can tell someone is a professional when it comes to midnight sales is not by how quickly they are in the store, but how long they are able to keep their cool and outlast the crowds.
Then there are the regulars, who K says become even more “regular” once the holiday sales roll around. These are the customers who like to test the waters.
Like the people who try to get cash back from leftover amounts on gift cards. Or the people who switch out one tag for another.
And you can’t blame the customer, he says.
“You have to be nice and tell them, I can give you 20 percent off maybe, that’s all. The same people come in every week, and they know how they can use coupons, they know the rules, but they still push it.”
When K says no to a customer request, a common response is, “At the Cherry Creek Mall they gave it to me with the coupon.”
But K says one of the most rampant customer habits during the holidays is people who want to use their coupons for Levis.
“They try to use normal coupons to get 20 percent off on a pair,” he says. Levis at the metro mall Macy’s are a hot commodity, the most popular brands being the 501s, the 514s and the 511s, according to K.
But K wouldn’t trade his job for the world. First of all, he is one of the few employees that gets to wear jeans at work everyday rather than uncomfortable dress pants. And second, he gets a lot of hours.
“I like it, mostly because when I deal with money, I like the feel of it in my hands,” he says.
And if a customer becomes entirely unruly, there is always the avoidance tactic card.
“For people who are mean, I just leave the register and let a co-worker handle it,” he says. K’s favorite escape is doing “fallback,” which is recovering clothes that have wandered from their respective shelf or rack.
“It’s way better, because I don’t have to deal with people.”
The Ghost of Tickle-Me Elmo | Abba Dabba Don’t | Sorry for ruining your Christmas | Forever in Blue Jeans