It’s almost a daily occurrence now. There is some crazy drastic difference between the stock count on a title and how many of that book we actually have in the store. It could be a receiver error because no one[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
Mike: Bookseller
1711 comics.
My wife actually fielded a customer the other day looking for a Paleo diet cookbook that was also low carb, and vegan. I could only assume that the customer has never fully understood ANY of those things separately let alone[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
We have had significant cutbacks on a lot of scheduling, and payroll. What hasn’t changed with those updates is the amount of work. I am wondering what kind of Six Sigma Lean crapola Home Office is running to think that[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
V-Carts are fairly convenient contraptions that allow us to move a good 200 pounds of books around the sales floor easily. You don’t need to do too much upkeep for them either. Very few moving parts. Of the few moving[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
We had someone ask us this question a little while back. they were honestly looking for day planners, or, agendas, to plan their days out. Completely innocent question. But with all of the current affairs books praising or bashing political[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
While I am as far away from temperance and completely for legalization I don’t partake in anything considered a vice. …unless you count Magic the Gathering… Do whatever you want with your body, it’s your body, no one owns it.[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
I get taken aback for a second or two when I ask if a customer wants to order a book into the store and they say “yes.” I am so used to people saying “No” nowadays. People have phones, glowing[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
One annoyance that crops up almost on the daily is when a “customer” comes in to buy a small cup of coffee or a newspaper and proceeds to pay for the item with a 50 or 100 dollar bill. The[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
This cookie sale has been going on for quite a while now. It seems like one just has to walk into the store and you’re handed a coupon for an extra cookie. It must be doing something right for it[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
Specialty Hobbies and Collectibles and Educational Toys and Games. I’m sure The Bookstore has made a good amount of money just off of me from those Specialties. While the selection isn’t where I want it to be (I want all[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
The Book Club Event is today. I have no idea what to expect at my store. I don’t know if anyone is going to show up at all. As far as I know we haven’t had anyone volunteer to read[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
I could be wrong, but I still don’t think this Book Club is going to be a success. Choosing “The Female Persuasion” seems too focused for a company/nation-wide event. I have heard some people say that the choice to start[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
The best I can say about the book that’s being feature for The Book Club is that people are ambivalent towards it. Some love it, some hate it, and a great majority seem to not even care at all. The[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
I guess The Bookstore is hosting a Book Club? I can see where this could have been a fun event. But focusing on one specific book is a bad move from what I can see. If this book isn’t Harry[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
The crabby customer who happens to be a retail worker…. They really should know better. I’d like to say that if everyone worked at least 6 months in a customer service/retail type job, the world would be a better place.[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
I think donating hair for wigs and other useful purposes is pretty nifty. I haven’t been patient enough to grow my hair out to a sufficient length to do it myself though. I have in the past gotten my hair[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
I feel like I have to quickly add to this comic that there is nothing inherently wrong with any of these categories of books. Plenty of fine reading material found in all. I’m sure there have been many people who[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
For The Bookstore we tend to get new Pop Figures in a week or more later than everyone else. Exceptions include all the convention exclusives and similar stuff. It is still fun to see all the new models show up[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
I still don’t understand the decision to keep displaying Summer Reading books every year and give the display a different sign and name. We all know what high school kids are coming in for during this time of year and[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
We have spring break running through a few schools during this week. That means more kids running around the store. We can try and try to tell the kids to not run, or ask the parents to actually WATCH their[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
I went on a big road trip with my wife these past two weeks. Visiting coasts and beaches to mountains and friends and family. Also bookstores. Specifically The Bookstore. Booksellers out of state were nice, well kept, well staffed, and[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
There are even more awful odors that can be experienced while working in retail. A few of the more common ones that you can’t avoid anywhere are here in this strip. The easiest to fix is the dirty diaper, change[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
There are people who come into The Bookstore asking casually about where the restrooms are, for a just in case scenario. Others come in with a determined look, concentrating on making sure things are under control, that ask where the[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
Most mornings during this time of year are slow going for retail. Spring time isn’t usually a big rush out and buy the stuff season, and hours get shaved down to the bare minimum for everyone. Mid-shifts are practically nonexistent,[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
I don’t quite understand how important things like cell phones or WALKING CANES can get left behind at The Bookstore. It happens all the time. Cellphones are average 600 dollars a piece, signing contracts and paying monthly may hide that[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
The headsets we’ve been issued have helped us booksellers communicate to each other “customers” with suspicious behaviors. It’s gotten a few of us a little riled up, inspired by all those cop shows and spy movies where people are staking[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
This one goes way back for me. When I first started at The Bookstore I was the regular shelver scheduled, day in day out, every workday morning. I’d arrive about five to ten minutes before the 7am start time and[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
The baristas have to take out the trash regularly from the in store cafe, and with our cafe being the “island style” in the middle of the store set up, there are no close exits for them to take the[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
There have been some picky customers asking for us to grab a “fresh copy” from the magical back room. The stockroom isn’t anything special. It’s where we receive in shipments and then push those shipments out to the floor. That’s[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
I’ve been working at the Stevens Creek store location for over five years now and I can say that ALL of the good options for food are gone. The crappy pepperoni pizza has been replaced by even crappier “healthy” flat[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
We have some issues with our store locks for sure. If they aren’t almost completely broken and bending our keys to the breaking point, they’re not staying locked like they should be. There are tricks that the management team has[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
There are many questions I have about the efficacy of these mystery shop things. An outside company hired by The Bookstore comes in to watch us do our job and catch us NOT doing our job the way Home Office[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
We have an abundance of choices for customers looking in to vindicate their feelings on the President of the United States. While most people have come in to buy that “Fire and Fury” book, a lot of other customers are[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
Of the many toys that we have supplied to our stores to sell, I hate these cheap, wooden push along toys. I don’t know how many are actually sold, I’ve only seen them broken, dirty, and left spread throughout the[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
Let me preface this comic by saying this first: I totally understand people with legitimate health issues and crises that pip up that need a day or more to figure out. I hope you all have an understanding management team[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
I was helping an elderly woman track down a copy of “Lincoln in the Bardo” a couple weeks back, we are fairly short staffed at the moment too. Phones ring until the ONE bookseller available on the floor can answer[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
From time to time we get in some oddly shaped, oddly proportioned books. A lot of those weird shapes lend themselves to kids books. Books with wheels, books shaped with a bite taken out of them, that sort of thing.[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
While working on this comic I was watching a Twitch stream of a group of people playing Dungeons and Dragons. I think that’s awesome. Nerd culture has normalized so much now that all the cool board games are spreading out[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
Visits from district managers and higher ups are questionable for me. They’re always a lot of hullabaloo around the impending walk through from a district manager and too many people running around trying to fix things. I understand there are[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
It’s safe to say that not many people are happy with what happened last week. Not hearing much of anything from home office hasn’t helped matters either. I expect some subversive and disobedient Bookstore employees are going to find subtle[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
I’ve been thinking about this dissolving/removal of full-time positions at The Bookstore for the past week or so now. I think we’re going to feel this change for a long time to come. A lot of people are understandably angry.[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
For those of us who have survived the cuts and removal of full time positions at The Bookstore, we are still dealing with it. That whole “Why not me?” thought has run through my mind along with “Thank goodness I[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
The hammer came down really heavy this week. A lot of my fellow booksellers were let go. I had been hearing things left and right about an investor or two wanting their money back. Hours were being cut way too[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
I work in customer service of course, and we are required to ask customers if they need help finding stuff. Plenty of people say “no” in perfectly reasonable tones. Some customers say “yes” and actually mean it. Then there are[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
I find too many half finished cups of coffee left abandoned on our shelves in The Bookstore. There has to be some sort of mental goof that happens with customers and their drinks when they’re in a bookstore. Coffee nowadays[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
We get a lot of students calling or asking us if we sell and/or rent textbooks. We don’t rent anything at a BOOKSTORE WHERE YOU BUY THINGS, and rarely carry any dependable selection of textbooks. I haven’t run the numbers[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
By now people know that the original title for the first Harry Potter book is “The Philospher’s Stone.” It’s hard to change twenty years of seriously entrenched pop culture though. Scholastic isn’t going to update their paperback editions over here[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
We’ve gone through a couple versions of what to call the Self Improvement section over the years and I don’t feel like we’ll stop any time soon either. It’ll get changed up again the next time Oprah has a new[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
The state of California in which I currently reside has water/drought problems. My wife tells me most of the state is a semi-arid desert environment. We don’t get rain as frequently as we need and we have huge portions of[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
These “customers” are one of the worst types or people to deal with. If they aren’t squirreling away stacks of books into low trafficked areas of the store just to read and eventually abandon, they’re the type that complain about[…]↓ Read the rest of this entry…
