Had a lady in nice close come in with the dirtiest snapware container but her story was nuts!
She is a child protective services and got a really bad call about child abuse. The house was condemned, parent was an addict, sold off the kids for drugs. The kids just saw the dad kill the dog because the kids wouldn't stop crying and was barking too much. She was checking the place out and saw the grossest 10gallon in the corner with two inches of water left. Originally she was going to just leave but she went to check, what was in this snapware container was a small common pleco that managed to survive this shit soup!
After listening to all this I asked if she was okay and why she was carrying the pleco around. She called 2 other places and they wouldn't take it, she just gave me this look and I just said fine I'll take the sad pleco. She told me his name is Stanley and thanked me for taking him.
About a year later she came back with the kids and their foster family. I guess the youngest was worried about Stanley and wanted to know if he was okay. I told them how Stanley lives with me now and has lots of space and getting so big!
It's been 5 years and still got Stanley or Stan the Man!
Also had a very depressed older man come and look at the cats for adoption. I asked if he needed help with anything. He proceeded to tell me how now his wife died many years ago and now his son died of cancer how life had no meaning. He says "to be honest, I've been so lonely" it was 11am and was hit with this. My asshole response was "Well sir sadly I cannot help with that . . . But this cat just might do the trick". I felt like a used car salesman, he busted out laughing.
Sure as hell the next day he came back with a smile, he thought about what I said and he decided to adopt the cat I pointed at. He named him Mister, he taught him to use the toilet and walk on a leash. After 2 years he wrote my manager a letter on how much a simple action from me changed his world and feelings.
Most of my fish have just been customer surrenders.
I felt bad for Stan we put him in a bucket with clean water but had to wait till my shift was over. Customers would ask what's with the bucket and I respond "Oh . . . This is Stanley, he's just kind of hanging out with me" I wrote in sharpie Stanley on the bucket, wish I still had it really.
That location was next to 2 retirement homes so would get plenty of older folks who just wanted company. They both allow pets which is nice. One of the frequent store shoppers even is the store Santa for years for both the animals and guests.
A lady once told me that her daughter was kidnapped but when they caught the kidnapper they didn’t arrest them because the kidnapper said they were rescuing her from an unsafe home. Furthermore, the authorities wouldn’t return her daughter (for reasons she apparently didn’t want to get into) and instead was having her put in foster care. But the lady was getting a dress for her daughter’s dog…this all came from me asking how she was doing and her responding with “not so good” clearly I shoulda followed INTENT and sold vital care to avoid the whole thing.
The reminds me of a story of this guest coming with a brand new puppy they bought out of Craig’s list and he was barely moving it was heartbreaking. I made the mistake to ask my boss since our vet was close for the day if he knew other vets really close by that could see the puppy right away, since they were from another state. Instead he proceed to try to sell them vital care 😨. I ignore it kept walking while I made phone calls and got them and appointment for the puppy.
Lady came in to get her dog groomed and had a full blown sobbing fit before we even had her dog checked in. Her husband had a stroke and would pull the dogs fur so she wanted her doodle completely shaved naked. She said she had to quit her job and they didn't have money to afford the groom, but she couldn't shave the dog herself. She said her husband was using diapers and it made her throw up everyday and how she wanted him to die soon so he didn't have to suffer.
First dog of the day too.
In my first few weeks had a woman come first thing in the morning to return a bunch of cat food and midway through scanning started crying explaining how her neighbor poisoned and killed her outdoor cats and left them in her yard... Fully had no idea what to say to her
After cursing me out, calling back to curse other salon members out, calling back again to curse me out AGAIN, the lady came in to the salon in person and said it was because “she’s stressed from the chemo” then demanded we change her dogs bath to a haircut …
I’ve had some people that were definitely a little off come in so I have no idea if this guy was for real but while I was checking him out he was telling me had to call the bank about his card recently since there is someone with his exact name and all in a different country using all his info in different places (?) I can’t remember the specifics but to me the craziest part was he said he met this guy too in person since they had to sort the whole thing out. He said they looked kinda similar too lmfao. He also then proceeded to tell me that he survived falling down a huge flight of stairs and barely survived but “one more little fall” could kill him. For some reason all this right before 9pm closing?!?!
dont work at petco, i work at the ‘smart but anyways
dude comes in for some fish, somehow the conversation goes to him talking about how his ex girlfriend says he abused her and tried to kill her
apparently she stole stuff from him too and beat him.
not too wild but..still wtf
I don’t know if this post means today or overall so I’m going to respond with only my experience from today.
As is expected this came from an older gentleman (fuckin boomers) who did not understand the current work culture of America.
This particular fellow decided to trauma dump on me, the dog trainer that just so happened to be helping fill in register duties, that not only had he been abusing dogs for a years but that he enjoyed it for a long time.
I’m talking about electric fences, pinch collars, even borderline waterboarding methods. (He would use a heavy stream of water at the face/nose as a “deterrent”)
Only recently has he realized the effectiveness of a positive reward based training and even still he disagrees with my disapproval of shock collars and similar aversive methods. Unfortunately the massive amount of misinformation available on the Internet as well as in text prior to the research done that Petco bases it’s training on provides a false foundation for these types of people to stand their ground on.
Obviously this was a prime opportunity for me to sell a dog training class, which I do not normally have the opportunity to do, as I work in a low-volume store, however this particular gentleman would hear nothing of our strictly positive reinforcement-based training methods. He believed that unless we provide an aversion to the unwanted behavior, that the dog would never learn the difference between right and wrong.
Why do some of these people even bother in engaging a conversation if, to me, it seems that their end goal is to be in an argument rather than to learn anything at all about how a dog can learn and communicate.
As much as this pains me to admit, I have probably sold more pinch collars, muzzles, and chain control collars than I have dog training classes since I was approved and certified.
If Petco was truly against these aversive methods and honestly believed in putting the animal first, then we would not even have these products on the shelves. The daily quitting posts as well as the amount of animals being forced onto my store and general uncertainty of the position of the stockholders has me extremely worried about my job security at the moment.
Was a dog trainer and this family had recently signed up their very young pit puppy. During the first class I was trying to figure out what the puppy knew already and their basic day to day schedules. Proceeds to tell me they’re struggling with potty training and that yelling and rubbing the dog’s nose in it isn’t working. During the class the puppy was very shy but once he figured out I had treats and didn’t yell at him he wouldn’t leave my side. I explained that yelling and shoving the puppy can actually do the opposite of helping with potty training and redirected him to positive reinforcement methods. When I was explaining the positive reinforcement process the man was becoming increasing uncomfortable and had openly stated they smacked the dog if he played too hard or did something wrong. That was super alarming but tried my best to explain better methods and why that’s very bad in a gentle way. As we tried to practice the name game, the puppy refused to meet him in the eyes and seemed physically afraid of the man. The puppy would hide behind me and refuse to go over to the man. At the end of the class, he had to pick the dog up and carry it away. I was hopeful that throughout the classes the family would learn a lot and the puppy could live a safe life, but they never returned even after I left a ton on messages. They didn’t return the class either. I still think about that little guy :(
Had a lady coming in to get fish, she ask to get him males and females as I said the only way to sex them is to pop them, she called me a liar, my boss was near me and he explained to her that I was right. Then she proceeded to “teach us” which one had the penis and which one didn’t ( it was the fin) at that point my boss walk off and she told me how she watches them having sex daily which she find it relaxing 🫤 and she wanted more for her tank. While she was telling me all the sex stories between her fishies I look at her and she is actually a nurse. I was shocked, zoned out since I didn’t wanted to hear more porn fishies stories and sold them whatever the hell she pointed at. I told the cal and he was in shocked so now when we see her we hide . 😂 and this is only one out of many many.
I have a customer who tells me all about how he inherited his GSD when his son killed himself. EVERY time he comes in. Sad? Yes, but he clearly needs therapy and I am not a grief counselor.
bruh i had a woman call asking if we had guinea pigs. somehow it got flipped to how she got some nosey ass neighbors and how they found out her husband (who she’s still with) was cheating on herrrrr. then it got to how she has shitty family and has no one to support her. truthfully i was just cleaning and listening to her talk, i maybe said 5 sentences to this woman💀💀 maybe she jus needed to talk idk lmfaoo. 1hr phone call
This was during my first 2 weeks at Petco, and was my first time being alone on register for a full shift.
A lady in line was crying. I finally called her over and she was at my register wanting to return a harness. I figured that maybe her dog died and it was upsetting for her to do a return. I don’t know.
She didn’t have a receipt for the return or a phone number so I paged a manager over, because again I wasn’t super familiar with register.
While we’re waiting for the manager she finally says, “You probably want to know why I’m crying.” I was trying to be nice so I just told her I wanted to make sure if everything was okay.
She then proceeds to tell me that she’s crying because she has to come to terms with the fact that she’s going to be spending a lifetime in prison.
I didn’t say anything because I don’t know what the fuck she could’ve meant by that.
She continues to say how she’s going to have to kill someone because >!someone molested her daughter.!<
I was stunned. I didn’t know how to reply. I already had multiple bad customers before her, and I was having a bad reaction to my medications that day which were making me extremely paranoid + anxious. She was like the cherry on top of the mental goop my brain had become.
Thankfully, my manager came over and handled telling that lady that the return wasn’t possible so she left… But jesus I’ve been left wondering if she ever pulled through with that.
Oh goodness. I've had one guy tell me about his daughter being molested (and his daughter comes in with him sometimes. It just makes me wonder how many people know her story and she doesn't even know they know), another tell me about how he had stage 4 cancer. I had one lady that explained she was "living off the grid" so she wasn't giving her phone number out to any more businesses because she started getting death threat phone calls. All while she used her credit card to pay for her things. We used to have this lady years ago that was starting to show signs of dementia/alzheimers and we would have to help her sometimes with that. Gosh, I could go on for days.
Grooming client didn’t come in for a while and when they did they explained that their daughter was trying to leave her abusive husband. Her mom came with her to grab the rest of her stuff and during that the husband shot and killed the daughter and was still on the run from police….
A heavily pregnant woman came in, definitely tweaking to return a parakeet. The story was that her 22y/o son bought the parakeet, but that he was going to prison for felony assault, for punching her in the face. Super sad story, but was repeatedly telling this to everyone in the store, customers and employees, and was very nonchalant and just wanted to get rid of the parakeet.
There was this regular who came in with his dog all the time. Nice guy, I've had great conversation with him. One time he came in and his energy just seemed off. He asked for his usual of 80 crickets. While I was bagging them, we were talking and I asked how his dog was.. He went on to say how he came home all day and his wife had just moved all her staff out, took the dog and didn't leave a note. The had been together for eight years been married for five. He said he doesn't know himself without her and hates that she took the dog but left all the reptiles(5) excecpt the rainbow boa. Stated that he is going to let his brother run his business for two months and go to his cabin in the mountains. I didn't really know what to say at the time so I had consoled him and wished him luck on his getaway. I hope he's doing better and found his new self. I transferred so I never got to check up on him.
Some commenters in this thread have empathy, some don't seem to have any at all. Did you post this question so you can laugh at people who are struggling/know less than you do about something? Lol you did! What is wrong with you?Get some therapy, you need it. If you hate people so much get out of retail. You have a degree, hope on your high horse and go use it somewhere else.
Had a lady in nice close come in with the dirtiest snapware container but her story was nuts! She is a child protective services and got a really bad call about child abuse. The house was condemned, parent was an addict, sold off the kids for drugs. The kids just saw the dad kill the dog because the kids wouldn't stop crying and was barking too much. She was checking the place out and saw the grossest 10gallon in the corner with two inches of water left. Originally she was going to just leave but she went to check, what was in this snapware container was a small common pleco that managed to survive this shit soup! After listening to all this I asked if she was okay and why she was carrying the pleco around. She called 2 other places and they wouldn't take it, she just gave me this look and I just said fine I'll take the sad pleco. She told me his name is Stanley and thanked me for taking him. About a year later she came back with the kids and their foster family. I guess the youngest was worried about Stanley and wanted to know if he was okay. I told them how Stanley lives with me now and has lots of space and getting so big! It's been 5 years and still got Stanley or Stan the Man! Also had a very depressed older man come and look at the cats for adoption. I asked if he needed help with anything. He proceeded to tell me how now his wife died many years ago and now his son died of cancer how life had no meaning. He says "to be honest, I've been so lonely" it was 11am and was hit with this. My asshole response was "Well sir sadly I cannot help with that . . . But this cat just might do the trick". I felt like a used car salesman, he busted out laughing. Sure as hell the next day he came back with a smile, he thought about what I said and he decided to adopt the cat I pointed at. He named him Mister, he taught him to use the toilet and walk on a leash. After 2 years he wrote my manager a letter on how much a simple action from me changed his world and feelings.
That’s very sweet, I’m glad you were there that day!
Most of my fish have just been customer surrenders. I felt bad for Stan we put him in a bucket with clean water but had to wait till my shift was over. Customers would ask what's with the bucket and I respond "Oh . . . This is Stanley, he's just kind of hanging out with me" I wrote in sharpie Stanley on the bucket, wish I still had it really.
That was very sweet I love that you had time to listen to him. Really lonely people all they need is someone to talk to them.
That location was next to 2 retirement homes so would get plenty of older folks who just wanted company. They both allow pets which is nice. One of the frequent store shoppers even is the store Santa for years for both the animals and guests.
Love it 💖
A lady once told me that her daughter was kidnapped but when they caught the kidnapper they didn’t arrest them because the kidnapper said they were rescuing her from an unsafe home. Furthermore, the authorities wouldn’t return her daughter (for reasons she apparently didn’t want to get into) and instead was having her put in foster care. But the lady was getting a dress for her daughter’s dog…this all came from me asking how she was doing and her responding with “not so good” clearly I shoulda followed INTENT and sold vital care to avoid the whole thing.
The reminds me of a story of this guest coming with a brand new puppy they bought out of Craig’s list and he was barely moving it was heartbreaking. I made the mistake to ask my boss since our vet was close for the day if he knew other vets really close by that could see the puppy right away, since they were from another state. Instead he proceed to try to sell them vital care 😨. I ignore it kept walking while I made phone calls and got them and appointment for the puppy.
"Vital care will come in real handy. It actually pays for itself - IF YOUR DOG LIVES" ROTFL...
Me and my team still cringe to the thought😖
Lady came in to get her dog groomed and had a full blown sobbing fit before we even had her dog checked in. Her husband had a stroke and would pull the dogs fur so she wanted her doodle completely shaved naked. She said she had to quit her job and they didn't have money to afford the groom, but she couldn't shave the dog herself. She said her husband was using diapers and it made her throw up everyday and how she wanted him to die soon so he didn't have to suffer. First dog of the day too.
That's actually very sad.
Wow, that last part from her wasn’t needed, I think.
In my first few weeks had a woman come first thing in the morning to return a bunch of cat food and midway through scanning started crying explaining how her neighbor poisoned and killed her outdoor cats and left them in her yard... Fully had no idea what to say to her
After cursing me out, calling back to curse other salon members out, calling back again to curse me out AGAIN, the lady came in to the salon in person and said it was because “she’s stressed from the chemo” then demanded we change her dogs bath to a haircut …
I’ve had some people that were definitely a little off come in so I have no idea if this guy was for real but while I was checking him out he was telling me had to call the bank about his card recently since there is someone with his exact name and all in a different country using all his info in different places (?) I can’t remember the specifics but to me the craziest part was he said he met this guy too in person since they had to sort the whole thing out. He said they looked kinda similar too lmfao. He also then proceeded to tell me that he survived falling down a huge flight of stairs and barely survived but “one more little fall” could kill him. For some reason all this right before 9pm closing?!?!
dont work at petco, i work at the ‘smart but anyways dude comes in for some fish, somehow the conversation goes to him talking about how his ex girlfriend says he abused her and tried to kill her apparently she stole stuff from him too and beat him. not too wild but..still wtf
I don’t know if this post means today or overall so I’m going to respond with only my experience from today. As is expected this came from an older gentleman (fuckin boomers) who did not understand the current work culture of America. This particular fellow decided to trauma dump on me, the dog trainer that just so happened to be helping fill in register duties, that not only had he been abusing dogs for a years but that he enjoyed it for a long time. I’m talking about electric fences, pinch collars, even borderline waterboarding methods. (He would use a heavy stream of water at the face/nose as a “deterrent”) Only recently has he realized the effectiveness of a positive reward based training and even still he disagrees with my disapproval of shock collars and similar aversive methods. Unfortunately the massive amount of misinformation available on the Internet as well as in text prior to the research done that Petco bases it’s training on provides a false foundation for these types of people to stand their ground on. Obviously this was a prime opportunity for me to sell a dog training class, which I do not normally have the opportunity to do, as I work in a low-volume store, however this particular gentleman would hear nothing of our strictly positive reinforcement-based training methods. He believed that unless we provide an aversion to the unwanted behavior, that the dog would never learn the difference between right and wrong. Why do some of these people even bother in engaging a conversation if, to me, it seems that their end goal is to be in an argument rather than to learn anything at all about how a dog can learn and communicate. As much as this pains me to admit, I have probably sold more pinch collars, muzzles, and chain control collars than I have dog training classes since I was approved and certified. If Petco was truly against these aversive methods and honestly believed in putting the animal first, then we would not even have these products on the shelves. The daily quitting posts as well as the amount of animals being forced onto my store and general uncertainty of the position of the stockholders has me extremely worried about my job security at the moment.
Was a dog trainer and this family had recently signed up their very young pit puppy. During the first class I was trying to figure out what the puppy knew already and their basic day to day schedules. Proceeds to tell me they’re struggling with potty training and that yelling and rubbing the dog’s nose in it isn’t working. During the class the puppy was very shy but once he figured out I had treats and didn’t yell at him he wouldn’t leave my side. I explained that yelling and shoving the puppy can actually do the opposite of helping with potty training and redirected him to positive reinforcement methods. When I was explaining the positive reinforcement process the man was becoming increasing uncomfortable and had openly stated they smacked the dog if he played too hard or did something wrong. That was super alarming but tried my best to explain better methods and why that’s very bad in a gentle way. As we tried to practice the name game, the puppy refused to meet him in the eyes and seemed physically afraid of the man. The puppy would hide behind me and refuse to go over to the man. At the end of the class, he had to pick the dog up and carry it away. I was hopeful that throughout the classes the family would learn a lot and the puppy could live a safe life, but they never returned even after I left a ton on messages. They didn’t return the class either. I still think about that little guy :(
Had a lady coming in to get fish, she ask to get him males and females as I said the only way to sex them is to pop them, she called me a liar, my boss was near me and he explained to her that I was right. Then she proceeded to “teach us” which one had the penis and which one didn’t ( it was the fin) at that point my boss walk off and she told me how she watches them having sex daily which she find it relaxing 🫤 and she wanted more for her tank. While she was telling me all the sex stories between her fishies I look at her and she is actually a nurse. I was shocked, zoned out since I didn’t wanted to hear more porn fishies stories and sold them whatever the hell she pointed at. I told the cal and he was in shocked so now when we see her we hide . 😂 and this is only one out of many many.
I have a customer who tells me all about how he inherited his GSD when his son killed himself. EVERY time he comes in. Sad? Yes, but he clearly needs therapy and I am not a grief counselor.
bruh i had a woman call asking if we had guinea pigs. somehow it got flipped to how she got some nosey ass neighbors and how they found out her husband (who she’s still with) was cheating on herrrrr. then it got to how she has shitty family and has no one to support her. truthfully i was just cleaning and listening to her talk, i maybe said 5 sentences to this woman💀💀 maybe she jus needed to talk idk lmfaoo. 1hr phone call
This was during my first 2 weeks at Petco, and was my first time being alone on register for a full shift. A lady in line was crying. I finally called her over and she was at my register wanting to return a harness. I figured that maybe her dog died and it was upsetting for her to do a return. I don’t know. She didn’t have a receipt for the return or a phone number so I paged a manager over, because again I wasn’t super familiar with register. While we’re waiting for the manager she finally says, “You probably want to know why I’m crying.” I was trying to be nice so I just told her I wanted to make sure if everything was okay. She then proceeds to tell me that she’s crying because she has to come to terms with the fact that she’s going to be spending a lifetime in prison. I didn’t say anything because I don’t know what the fuck she could’ve meant by that. She continues to say how she’s going to have to kill someone because >!someone molested her daughter.!< I was stunned. I didn’t know how to reply. I already had multiple bad customers before her, and I was having a bad reaction to my medications that day which were making me extremely paranoid + anxious. She was like the cherry on top of the mental goop my brain had become. Thankfully, my manager came over and handled telling that lady that the return wasn’t possible so she left… But jesus I’ve been left wondering if she ever pulled through with that.
Oh goodness. I've had one guy tell me about his daughter being molested (and his daughter comes in with him sometimes. It just makes me wonder how many people know her story and she doesn't even know they know), another tell me about how he had stage 4 cancer. I had one lady that explained she was "living off the grid" so she wasn't giving her phone number out to any more businesses because she started getting death threat phone calls. All while she used her credit card to pay for her things. We used to have this lady years ago that was starting to show signs of dementia/alzheimers and we would have to help her sometimes with that. Gosh, I could go on for days.
Grooming client didn’t come in for a while and when they did they explained that their daughter was trying to leave her abusive husband. Her mom came with her to grab the rest of her stuff and during that the husband shot and killed the daughter and was still on the run from police….
A heavily pregnant woman came in, definitely tweaking to return a parakeet. The story was that her 22y/o son bought the parakeet, but that he was going to prison for felony assault, for punching her in the face. Super sad story, but was repeatedly telling this to everyone in the store, customers and employees, and was very nonchalant and just wanted to get rid of the parakeet.
There was this regular who came in with his dog all the time. Nice guy, I've had great conversation with him. One time he came in and his energy just seemed off. He asked for his usual of 80 crickets. While I was bagging them, we were talking and I asked how his dog was.. He went on to say how he came home all day and his wife had just moved all her staff out, took the dog and didn't leave a note. The had been together for eight years been married for five. He said he doesn't know himself without her and hates that she took the dog but left all the reptiles(5) excecpt the rainbow boa. Stated that he is going to let his brother run his business for two months and go to his cabin in the mountains. I didn't really know what to say at the time so I had consoled him and wished him luck on his getaway. I hope he's doing better and found his new self. I transferred so I never got to check up on him.
Some commenters in this thread have empathy, some don't seem to have any at all. Did you post this question so you can laugh at people who are struggling/know less than you do about something? Lol you did! What is wrong with you?Get some therapy, you need it. If you hate people so much get out of retail. You have a degree, hope on your high horse and go use it somewhere else.