Clever lines

August 1, 2009

From time to time I will try to share with you the witty lines that come from working in retail. I currently work for Target and there are some very clever people that work there and shop there. I will sometimes overhear conversations between guests that I will try to share with you and/or things said by team members that I wish I had thought of to say. Hopefully, when taken out of context, these things still sound as witty, funny, or clever as I thought they did in person.

An example is one of my all time favorites. I have to go back to my Kmart days to find this one. I have had some experiences with Kmart that are story worthy, so I will share them from time to time, but this one story is funny. As you know, Kmart had the blue light special. This blue light used to be truly special "back in the day". People used to come to shop there hoping that we would have some blue light specials. One day, there was one that people became very excited to go and check out over in the clothing area. The actual event was a sale on men's' pants. I do not recall if they were khakis, dress pants, or jeans, but that is not important to the story. There was going to be a special reduction on these pants, so the person announcing the special over the intercom peaked every one's interest by announcing that they needed to immediately come over to the men's department "where we are taking our pants down." Suddenly, instead of a blue light special, we had a blue light district.

My second favorite story took place in Target. We use visual aids to direct the guest to the merchandise they are looking for ranging from the exact (you will find light bulbs in aisle G33), to the less precise (go down the aisle to the grills and the bug repellent is on the counter to your right). One day there was a guest looking in toys for a Mr. Potato Head. The employee she asked didn't have time to take her to the aisle, so he pointed down the main aisle and used a general reference. "See the gentleman standing by that shopping cart", he started. Before he could finish with "that is the aisle you want", the guest looked at the gentleman by the cart and asked, "Is that him?"

Finally, my third all time favorite came when I was ringing a guest at a cash register. She had an eclectic mix of merchandise that included a man's ball cap that had a fishing theme and some ladies spiky heeled shoes that were an animal print. I rang these two items and told her I thought they made for a rather strange outfit. She looked back at me and said she wasn't so sure about taking fashion advice from a man who wears red and khaki to work every day. Ouch! Funny though.

The most recent addition to funny lines does not crack the top three, but was clever at the time. When a department has been straightend at the end of the night, it needs to be "inspected" by a closing supervisor. The team lead is summoned over the walkie talkie to come and "walk" their area. Well, last night Andy's area was finished, so he got on the walkie and said "you can get a leash for my department because it is ready to be walked". Really Andy? Not bad though.

Until the next funny line...