Retail Hell

Retail Hell
Author: Freeman Hall
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 362
Release: 2010-09-18
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 1440508763

From Act I: "I think you left these behind," I said, handing them to her. This happens all the time when women try to return bags they've used. Tampons, lipstick, coins, Tic Tacs, and condoms are the top treasures found. "Greasy" let out a sigh as if I were the problem. "I really don't see what the problem is here. It's none of your business what I keep in my handbag." It is when my commission is at stake! I'm not your Designer Handbag Rental Service! My name is not BagBorrowOrSteal.com! This is a place Freeman Hall, a twenty-year veteran "on the floor," knows well. While delivering side-splitting stories alongside brutally cynical commentary, Freeman recounts his most shocking experiences in Retail Hell. From the time he was attacked by a customer's four-year-old, who grabbed onto his leg like a poodle and wouldn't let go, to the day he found the fitting room walls covered in s**t, Freeman has seen and heard (smelled and felt) it all! Horrifying and hilarious, this behind-the-scenes look at what really goes on at the Big Fancy Stores is rollicking, ready-to-wear wisdom for readers everywhere.

Malled

Malled
Author: Caitlin Kelly
Publisher: Penguin
Total Pages: 195
Release: 2011-04-14
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1101476370

One woman's midcareer misadventures in the absurd world of American retail. After losing her job as a journalist and the security of a good salary, Caitlin Kelly was hard up for cash. When she saw that The North Face-an upscale outdoor clothing company-was hiring at her local mall, she went for an interview almost on a whim. Suddenly she found herself, middle-aged and mid-career, thrown headfirst into the bizarre alternate reality of the American mall: a world of low-wage workers selling overpriced goods to well-to-do customers. At first, Kelly found her part-time job fun and reaffirming, a way to maintain her sanity and sense of self-worth. But she describes how the unexpected physical pressures, the unreasonable dictates of a remote corporate bureaucracy, and the dead-end career path eventually took their toll. As she struggled through more than two years at the mall, despite surgeries, customer abuse, and corporate inanity, Kelly gained a deeper understanding of the plight of the retail worker. In the tradition of Nickel and Dimed, Malled challenges our assumptions about the world of retail, documenting one woman's struggle to find meaningful work in a broken system.

Return to the Big Fancy

Return to the Big Fancy
Author: Freeman Hall
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 306
Release: 2012-09-18
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 1440541744

Bigger, Fancier, and more cutthorat than ever! When Freeman Hall left The Big Fancy to pursue his screenwriting dreams, he thought the horrors of working in a handbag department were finally over. But instead of fame and fortune, he found himself stuck behind a wall of script-killing rewrites, unable to make a living. In Return to the Big Fancy, Freeman shares his wildly entertaining journey back through the fiery gates of Retail Hell. He thought he had seen it all in his day, but with the bar set higher than ever before, employees are now graciously bowing before Corporate as they climb over fellow salespeople, and even friends, to earn enough transactions and commissions to actually survive. As he learns more of the wretchedness that has befallen the sales floor, he realizes that The Big Fancy has its customers and its employees on a short leash. But leave it to Freeman and the threat of disappearing commissions to rally the retail slaves and show Corporate who's really in charge!

Pretending You Care

Pretending You Care
Author: Norman Feuti
Publisher: Hyperion
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2007-10-16
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9781401308902

Ah, retail. It has lured in the best of us with promises of employee discounts (a sham), the "fun" of working with people (not so much), and flexible hours (dont make me laugh). What we got instead: cranky customers, sadistic managers, idiotic coworkers, and, oh yeah, the hell that is doing inventory. But there are ways to lessen the pain, and this retail handbook will show you how. Inside youll learn how to handle the crazies (both customers and coworkers), feign product knowledge, and make the best of working the register, all the while, of course, pretending you care. This book takes years of retail experience and condenses it into a guide that is as funny as it is useful. If you work in retail now, have done so in the past, or plan to do so in the future: this is the book for you.

Our Valued Customers

Our Valued Customers
Author: Tim Chamberlain
Publisher: Penguin
Total Pages: 98
Release: 2012-07-03
Genre: Humor
ISBN: 1101587024

While working for several years in a comic book store, MRTIM started drawing the more memorable customers and the things that they said. Based on the blog of the same name, and featuring popular entries as well as brand-new cartoons, Our Valued Customers chronicles the lively, witty, and often acerbic opinions and comments of the customers who shop at comic book stores, providing a fascinating glimpse into the inner world of the devoted comic book fan.

Rebel Bookseller

Rebel Bookseller
Author: Andrew Laties
Publisher: Seven Stories Press
Total Pages: 303
Release: 2011-07-19
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 160980337X

The revival of independent bookselling has already begun and is one of the amazing stories of our times. Bookseller Andy Laties wrote the first edition of Rebel Bookseller six years ago, hoping it would spark a movement. Now, with this second edition, Laties’s book can be a rallying cry for everyone who wants to better understand how the rise of the big bookstore chains led irrevocably to their decline, and how even in the face of electronic readers from three of America’s largest and most successful companies—Apple, Amazon, and Google—the movement to support locally owned independent stores, especially bookstores, is on the rise. From the mid-1980s to the present, Andy Laties has been an independent bookseller, starting out in Chicago, teaching along the way at the American Booksellers Association, and finally running the bookshop at the Eric Carle Museum in Amherst, Massachusetts. His innovations were adapted by Barnes & Noble, Zany Brainy, and scores of independent stores. In Rebel Bookseller, Laties tells how he got started, how he kept going, and why he believes independent bookselling has a great future. He alternates his narrative with short anecdotes, interludes between the chapters that give his credo as a bookseller. Along the way, he explains the growth of the chains, and throws in a treasure trove of tips for anyone who is considering opening up a bookstore. Rebel Bookseller is a must read for those in the book biz, a testament to the ingeniousness of one man man’s story of making a life out of his passionate commitment to books and bookselling.

Rethinking Hell

Rethinking Hell
Author: Christopher M. Date
Publisher: Wipf and Stock Publishers
Total Pages: 344
Release: 2014-04-15
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1630871605

Most evangelical Christians believe that those people who are not saved before they die will be punished in hell forever. But is this what the Bible truly teaches? Do Christians need to rethink their understanding of hell? In the late twentieth century, a growing number of evangelical theologians, biblical scholars, and philosophers began to reject the traditional doctrine of eternal conscious torment in hell in favor of a minority theological perspective called conditional immortality. This view contends that the unsaved are resurrected to face divine judgment, just as Christians have always believed, but due to the fact that immortality is only given to those who are in Christ, the unsaved do not exist forever in hell. Instead, they face the punishment of the "second death"--an end to their conscious existence. This volume brings together excerpts from a variety of well-respected evangelical thinkers, including John Stott, John Wenham, and E. Earl Ellis, as they articulate the biblical, theological, and philosophical arguments for conditionalism. These readings will give thoughtful Christians strong evidence that there are indeed compelling reasons for rethinking hell.

Rant of a Retailer

Rant of a Retailer
Author: Macy May Marcus
Publisher: Createspace Independent Publishing Platform
Total Pages: 330
Release: 2015-10-22
Genre:
ISBN: 9781517178253

Rant of a Retailer outlines the true-life adventures of Macy May Marcus, a seasoned department store manager, complete with insane customers, worse employees, and one horrendous boss. This is a non-fiction humor book on the trials and the (mild) triumphs of working in retail. According to The Wall Street Journal, roughly one of every 10 Americans is employed in the retail sector. This means 30 million of you readers will be able to relate to Macy's stories of agonized fitting room explosions and the horrors of the holidays. All stories are 100% true: every crazy, silly, disastrous, bumbling, lunatic story comes straight from the linoleum-covered racetrack of a major big-box retail store. With Chapters like, "Crazy Customers Make It All Worthwhile", "Returns, or Seriously? You're Really Returning This?", or "Loss Prevention, or Don't Steal! (But if You Do, You Won't Get Caught)", plus a bonus chapter on how to actually get what you want from bored, burnt-out, unmotivated retail employees. This is a laugh-out-loud, must-have manual for anyone who works - or shops - retail!

The Retail Doctor's Guide to Growing Your Business

The Retail Doctor's Guide to Growing Your Business
Author: Bob Phibbs
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
Total Pages: 279
Release: 2010-05-03
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0470587172

It's one of the toughest economies in years, but don't fear-the doctor is in Are you among the thousands of retailers frustrated by market challenges and looking for ways to take control of your business? Are you looking for the advice of an expert consultant, but unable to spend the money? Then The Retail Doctor's Guide to Growing Your Business is for you. By providing a step-by-step approach to evaluate your current business practices, The Retail Doctor offers professional guidance Redesign your organizational structure Reap the maximum returns on your investment Keep your business financially healthy Following the advice in these pages will help you devise a sound strategy to accomplish your goals and outperform your competitors. You'll also gain clear insight into all areas of human resource management, sales training, merchandising methods, and marketing. While your competitors are looking for a magic bullet to solve their problems, with The Retail Doctor's Guide to Growing Your Business, you can be making changes that will guarentee enormous returns and financial success.

Paperbacks from Hell

Paperbacks from Hell
Author: Grady Hendrix
Publisher: Quirk Books
Total Pages: 257
Release: 2017-09-19
Genre: Humor
ISBN: 1594749825

From the New York Times best-selling author of The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires comes a nostalgic and unflinchingly funny celebration of the horror fiction boom of the 1970s and ’80s. Take a tour through the horror paperback novels of two iconic decades . . . if you dare. Page through dozens and dozens of amazing book covers featuring well-dressed skeletons, evil dolls, and knife-wielding killer crabs! Read shocking plot summaries that invoke devil worship, satanic children, and haunted real estate! Horror author and vintage paperback book collector Grady Hendrix offers killer commentary and witty insight on these trashy thrillers that tried so hard to be the next Exorcist or Rosemary’s Baby. Complete with story summaries and artist and author profiles, this unforgettable volume dishes on familiar authors like V. C. Andrews and R. L. Stine, plus many more who’ve faded into obscurity. Also included are recommendations for which of these forgotten treasures are well worth your reading time and which should stay buried.