Minor vent - What does closed mean to you?

[Serena]

What does "shoppers we have 15 minutes left for shopping," mean.

The store will be closed in 5 minutes.

The store is closed,............

Maybe I'm delusional but to me that means finish up and go away.

 

[Pop Daddy]

that means the rest of you people got to leave

 

[Cindy B]

I can't stand when they just stand there, and I start sweeping, and hanging by the door...

My manager tends to make a big show of "locking the door" so they get the hint!

 

[I_Know_You2!]

That means to meander around after all those other people are out of the way...right?

 

[Serena]

thanks I needed that.

 

[Jolie C]

I think it means pay and get out. Some people think it means get a shopping cart.

 

[Nancy]

When we close on Christmas Eve we start announcing at 5 that the store is closing in 1 hour. At 6 we have to walk the store and tell people they need to get up to the register with their purchases...the store is closing...we get arguments about it. At 5:45 the announcement clearly states please take your purchases to the register at this time. I wish we could say...oh please it's Christmas and we would all like to go home and be with our families...move it up front now or forget it! By the time we round up everyone and actually get the store closed it is closer to 7 then 6.

 

[SnoWhite]

The first day of our Anniversary sale we were supposed to close at 10pm.
At 10pm they announced the store was closing.
At 10:15 they announced the store was closed.
They did that every 10 minutes afterward

Until....11pm. When we FINALLY got to go home. And there were still a couple customers on the first floor.
It drives me crazy, you have plenty of time, get your stuff, and leave! Or come back tomorrow morning! It is so rude, they think nothing of keeping us there when we have families, etc. to get home to, not to mention are tired from working all day!

Ok sorry...I guess I needed to vent as well

Gotta love retail.

Lisa

 

[Planogirl]

I've gone into a store just before closing and I've literally run to get whatever I came in for. No meandering and checking things out, I just run and grab it and hurry back to the front. I always feel guilty if I keep anyone waiting.

 

[orvilleair]

Serena, does the store close at 8:00 pm Ohio or Indiana time? Gotta love the fact that half the year Ohio is an hour ahead and the other half, we're on the same time. Mom grew up near the border.

 

[heart4pooh]

I went to a circuit city the other night to get a digital camera. I knew which one I wanted and got there at 8:30 knowing they close at 9pm. The salesman was very helpful with all kinds of info. Then he told me they were holding the register opened for me, was I going to be purchasing a camera? OMG! I didn't know where the time went!! It was 9:20!!! To make matters worse the camera I decided on wasn't available and had to be special ordered. They had a problem special ordering it and the store manager had to come to get it in the computer. I guess their policy is that no employees could leave the store until all customers were gone. Good Gracious! They had daggers coming out of their eyes. It was very uncomfortable for all of us. I wish they had announced that the store was closing. I ended up with the camera I initially went in to get.

 

[powellrj]

I so feel your pain.... When DH use to manage grocery stores they would close at 11, but you always had that last minute person who PROMISED they just need one or two things till they got in the door, then they did their weekly shopping.

 

[goofy4tink]

We used to start turning off lights, then rambled around the store telling people that we were doing a floor check to make sure no one got locked in overnight!!!! I just hate those that feel they can hang out 'till after the door is locked!!!

 

[cvemom]

I know what you mean. I used to lock doors turn lights off one by one an some people still wouldn't budge. Furthermore....other people would stand at the door and keep knocking to get in!

 

[Serena]

Our store will shut down 15 minutes after the store closes. We don't have any control over it. If a customer is still here we have to call St. Louis to have them turn things back on.
The registers and most of the lights get turned off automatically. We have to have our drawers closed up before it gets shut down.

 

[Kteacher]

I've also noticed that a lot of the times the post closing shoppers end up buying something that can't possibly be that much of an emergency that they needed to run out to a store right before it closes to buy this item. I work p/t in a dept. store, and the other night I had a woman buy one yellow was cloth at 9:10 p.m.

 

[hrh_disney_queen]

OMG, I just had a KMart flashback. I worked for them about 18 years ago, and we would make those announcements, 15 minutes, 10, 5 til closing-trying to get people out the door. We had one woman we called "Crazy Lady". At exactly 2 minutes before closing, she would hide her keys somewhere in the store, and we would all be waiting around while security helped her try to find her keys..The store policy was that all cashiers had to stay until the last customer was out the door. They would look and look and finally at about 10 minutes after closing, she would find her keys, then proceed to the checkout to pay for her stuff. She used to do it about once a month. Someone would spot her coming into the store, and we all knew we would be late getting out that night..

I used to love it when security (when the last customer was walking out the door-late) would say, "Security, release the dogs."

 

[Amberle3]

What's the standard for restaurants and closing times?

A few years ago my fiance and I were on a bit of a road trip and pulled into our hotel for the night. We had arrived fairly late, had spent a long time on the road and we were tired and hungry. We checked in, got to our room, and then decided to get something for dinner.

When we got to the restaurant we noticed they were closing in half an hour. We figured that should be fine. When we were seated the hostess/manager said "You know we're closing in half and hour" and we said that yes, we were aware of that. I think there was another couple in the restaurant at the time. We placed our orders (nothing too complex, it was spaghetti in fact) and waited for our food. Our salads were brought our right away, and then the hostess/manager proceeded to start vacuuming the restaurant. Not just in the restaurant, but all around us and even under our chairs. Now being tired and hungry I wasn't about to sit there and be vacuumed, so I asked that she please pack our dinners to go and we'd take them up to the room to eat. We were out of the restaurant before their scheduled closing time.

Since then I've been apprehensive about going to restaurants close to their closing times. Whenever we do, I always ask if it's going to be a problem and the usual response is that their "closing time" is the time they stop letting customers in. Now I know that obviously isn't the same for a retail store, but what is common for restaurants? Is closing time usually the time the restaurant shuts down, when the kitchen shuts down, or when customers are no longer seated?

 

[Octoberbride03]

I work for Target, and at our store we start announcing at 8:30pm that store will close at 10. And that means you'd better have your stuff up to the register at 10 because we will and do turn the lights off on you. The goal at the store is to have all the money in the safe by 10:20 so we can prepare the store for the next day.

It is always the nuts that come in at closing. I had a woman once who had a whole cart full of kids clothes and hair stuff and what not. She didn't bother looking at prices on the items or stickers on the shelf, but any hair item over 3 dollars, she didn't want. So i had to scan them in and tell her how much. This is at 10 after 10 and i had 4-5 more carts behind her. When i was done with hers it was 20 after and she wanted me to go through the reciept so we cold count up her items. I told her i checked for double scans b4 i charged her(so i lied) and if it didn't match when she got home just to bring it back the next day so she'd get credit. Mind you the lights were off, and there were over 60 items on her reciept. Boy were the ppl behind her happy to see her go.

As far as restaurants go, seems there is no set pattern. I've seen restaurants that seat right till closing then just lock the doors to new customers. And I've seen restaurants that stop seating 1 hour b4 closing. So that's all over the map.

But yeah, retail is so much fun

 

[piglet too]

I work at Toys R Us and most nights we have to deal with this too. We joke over the headsets about letting the dogs loose and what not, but we have to be nice to the guests. Last week we had this lady who we told that we had closed 10 minutes ago, "oh but I need to find the Strawberry Shortcake stuff that's what I came in for." So what was she dwadling for??? When I work in the video game area, I can not start my back-room stuff until all the guests are gone same with putting out movies on Monday nights. I just don't think that the late shoppers realize that there are things that the store just can not do when they are there!!

Oh, my all-time favorite was the guest who complained that we had pallets out for the night crew while she was still shopping, uh hello, we closed 20 minutes ago!!!!