I was reminiscing about my first interaction with an American customer I had when I had just started working (I don’t live in America, she was a tourist or something.) I worked in retail, and was taking care of a long line of customers. This American lady was at the end of the line. When she gets to me she asks to see my boss, so I head back and tell my boss a customer wants to talk to him, while I turn to some other work in the back of the store. A few minutes later my boss comes back and says the lady was upset with me and my behaviour, because I had not greeted her as she entered the store (because I was busy helping another customer.) The situation has perplexed me ever since, do all American stores employ greeters? I’m aware of the concept, how big stores like Walmart employ people to stand at the front door and greet people. But is it like that for every store in America?
I honestly did not realize Walmart ever had greeters. They’ve always had someone at the entrance/exit. But they just check my receipt to make sure I didn’t shoplift. I didn’t realize anyone acted as greeters there. Is it the same people checking your receipt for shoplifting or no?
Also, in case OP wants to know…most stores do NOT have receipt-checkers at the exit, either. It’s just that Walmart does because it’s a store that is prone to shoplifting.
They used to pride themselves on the fact they hired senior citizens to stand at the entrance and greet people for minimum wage. Personally, I only ever started seeing the reciept checkers in stores other than Costco when self-checkout became a thing. And they do it at a lot of major retailers like Walmart and Target. Not so much things like Dollar General (who doesnt even hire enough staff to actually stock their freaking shelves) or local small shops.
Lmao so I worked at a Dollar Tree for a few months before. Shit was wild. You were expected to check out customers, stock shelves, and put away “go backs” (items that customers didn’t want) on the shelves all concurrently. Because there was never anyone working in the store bahaha
That’s because Dollar General and anything with so much as to have ‘Dollar’ in their store’s name or function like one, expects you to be a swiss-army knife of an employee while still getting shit pay and benefits.
It was a thing when I was a kid. They would hire an elderly or mentally handicapped person to stand at the entrance and say hi to everyone. They got good PR for giving a job to someone “in need”. But the real reason was that they found that simply having someone say hi to you when you walk in the door made people feel seen, and therefore, made them less likely to shoplift.
Fun fact, you don’t have to waste your time showing them your receipt. They cannot force you to do that. If you have it and just walk past them, you have nothing to worry about.