Shopping Maul
The first rule of holiday shopping: There are no rules
- By Caitlin Kelly
- Smithsonian magazine, December 2009, Subscribe
Shopping, no matter the state of the economy, remains our true national sport. Illustration by Eric Palma
Elbows out, adrenaline pumping, they line up by the thousands, aquiver with the thrill of the chase. Their focus is absolute, their aim impeccable, their arms powerful, their speed impressive. Impede or deter them at your peril.
Shopping, no matter the state of the economy, remains our true national sport—not football, basketball or baseball, which come with referees, umpires, fines and actual rules. This is cage match fighting without the cage. The playing season is short but intense, kicking off with Black Friday and reaching a fever pitch on December 24—the all-star playoffs.
As a former saber fencer who has worked the past two years as a sales associate at a posh mall, I've lived the heart-pounding, sweaty-palmed challenge of ferocious competition. At least on the fencing strip, I had a metal helmet and a sharp, pointed weapon to protect myself. Competitors who behaved badly were penalized and tossed out.
At the mall: I wish.
When we roll open our store's heavy glass door each morning, we inhale our last calm, deep breath of the day. By late evening, we've scraped fresh gum off the counters, picked up half-eaten pretzels from the floor and refolded sweaters so many times our hands are raw and swollen.
Remember The Birds, Alfred Hitchcock's classic 1963 horror film? Every time Tippi Hedren stepped outdoors, a cloud of birds enveloped her, hellbent on pecking her to death.
That's pretty much life on our floor:
"Miss!"
"Can you help..."
"I need..."
"Do you have this in red?"
"I'm looking for..."
A lot of shoppers seem to think that we're carnival barkers endowed with the ability to instantly guess their height and weight. I once had a mother ask me to sell her three coats for her children—ages 3, 5 and 7—without a clue as to what sizes they wore. As we race to and from the stockrooms, trying to memorize a dozen requests, we pray that the items the shoppers so desperately need are actually in the stockroom (usually sitting high atop a shelf or stuffed within an unmarked box). And after we've finished our scavenger hunt and come up empty, we hear the question that is repeated endlessly in my nightmares: "Could you check again?"
The shoppers we dread most are the upscale customers who enter the store as if they were being carried on a sedan chair. These are the people whose daily lives are soothed by an army of the deferential: nannies, maids, au pairs, interns, assistants, employees, drivers and personal trainers. One of them plopped her $5,000 designer handbag on my counter and barked, "Keep an eye on that, would you?" They and their children expect a level of obeisance that's positively pre-revolutionary. The French Revolution, that is.
And, while we welcome eager French and Spanish tourists bearing beaucoup d'euros, we really hate it when they insist on standing thisclose to us. We get it—it's a European thing. But, really, we can hear them just fine from several feet away.
Maybe the day will come when somebody will publish a formal rulebook for shoppers and install penalty boxes throughout the mall. But, until then, here are a couple of simple guidelines to follow: First, try to remember why you're here. To buy something. Not to thrust your self-importance into the faces of salespeople earning $9 an hour with no commission.
And when we utter the word "No"—as in "No, that doesn't come in your size"—please try not to take it personally. Behave like the seasoned competitors we know you are. On the soccer field, a searing kick to the shin is inevitable. Hockey players expect to get slammed into the boards. And shortstops know a bad bounce can blacken their eye.
After all, it's just a game.
Caitlin Kelly lives in Tarrytown, New York, blogs at trueslant.com and is writing a memoir about her retail days.
Subscribe now for more of Smithsonian's coverage on history, science and nature.
Related topics: Christmas Commercial Buildings
| Tweet | Digg |
Comments (4)
Today is Aug 12, 2011, i just read Caitlin Kelly's book and went to find the article on the internet that she mentions in the book as something that she wrote and it paid almost as much as she could attain in a bonus in retail work.
Posted by Joel on August 12,2011 | 03:27 PM
I just finished reading this article and found most of it appaling. I worked a few years in a retail environment and, yes, some customers expect too much of sales people. But, that goes with a retail job. I feel that Ms. Kelly definitely does not belong in a sales job. If I were her supervisor, I'd suggest she do me and my customers a favor and stick to writing.
Posted by artsea on January 1,2010 | 03:38 PM
Your article resurrected memories of my very brief experience in retail in NYC back in the 1960s. In college and seeking a part time job, I applied and was accepted at a branch of Alexander's on (if memory serves) 125th Street. My first afternoon on the job was my last. Shoppers laid waste to every display in the place, and as soon as I'd folded an item it'd be yanked off the display, fondled, and tossed on the floor again. I went home a wreck, and the next day called the store to resign and told them they owed me nothing for the prior day-- I considered it a learning experience!
So, Ms Kelly, press onward, with the knowledge that in 45 years NOTHING in mass-retail has changed
George Pisani
Posted by George Pisani on December 6,2009 | 10:58 AM
Wow, you have portrayed that so accurately i am having flash backs to the black friday of "03" when the man/women accused me of line cutting (which of course i wasn't) and i spent the next three hours trying to get out of the electronics department with a candy cane to defend myself.
Posted by Beatriz Lopez on November 22,2009 | 10:01 PM