Working in retail taught me to fall in love with ringing in something new: calm, quiet January.
Imagine the living room and kitchen
on Christmas afternoon. Multiply that mess by fifty, and that’s what the store
usually looked like on January third. Unlike home, though, we couldn’t toss everything
in a hefty bag, a closet, or the attic. We threw away Starbuck's
cups, chicken nuggets, candy wrappers, and gum, and the rest was gathered
and sold to customers who threw out their old and made room for new.
We were anxious to get rid of the
old: sweaters, coats, gloves, and flannel shirts, and looked forward to ringing up the new and to the calm quiet of January, but getting there took work.
1.
Search the store for more old to mark down and add to the clearance
zone. If we were lucky, we’d find
them together and orderly on one rack while having a good battery for
the scanner. That never happened.
2.
Hunt for tags for old
and new. As savvy as retail associates are forced to be, they haven’t
memorized prices for the entire stock. When Siri becomes a retail
associate, she’ll be employee of the year. Until then, UPCs run the
place, and the UPCs that disappear the fastest are the last shirt, pant,
earring, purse, etc.
3. Move lost old back home with
the rest of the old. The more old we rang up, the more room we had
for the new, so the trampled and tried on, and the folded in a box under the
tree until thrown in a bag and returned on December 26 had to look appealing for the customers who always turned an old into next year's new.
4. INVENTORY. If we
didn't ring it up and see it leave the store, we counted it. Saturday
after closing, we were tired, but BEEP we were soon BEEP energized with the constant
BEEPING of dozens of scanners all BEEP over the store until midnight.
6:00AM Sunday
morning BEEP we were sleepy but had to BEEP return to scan every sock 1,2,3 on
every row BEEP, 62, 63 BEEP...80,81 then press escape (we wish), count every
sock individually 1, 2, 3,..67, 68,...79. Scanner says 81, recount socks
1,2,3,...77,78. Repeat for scarves, wash cloths, purses, shoes, BEEP
boxed jewelry, necklaces, dishes, etc., sometimes keying 13 digits
manually, crawling across BEEP the floor counting panties, climbing on ladders
counting towels and BEEP cupcake paraphernalia. The reward was a fifteen-minute snack break, home
for four hours, then returning after close and counting BEEP until midnight.
Katy
