Rolling Uphill

Angry retail customer Irene Wright is very upset, but the retail worker taking the brunt of her verbal assault feels she should maybe be focusing her ire in more of an upward direction.

Wright is currently shopping at local big-box store All-In-One in Burbank, Illinois and has had trouble finding any workers to assist her.

“This place is never staffed when I come here!” shouts Wright in the face of sales employee Denise Hendershot. “I wander around and around and who’s there to help me, hmm? Nobody!”

“I don’t really know what to tell you,” says Hendershot. “Yeah, we're understaffed for sure, but unfortunately those decisions are made well above my pay grade.”

“Well you, as a representative of this store–”

While we, and probably Denise Hedershot as well, stop listening as Wright continues to berate a fellow victim of the thing she’s complaining about, we have to wonder: If not the employee on the sales floor, who is in charge of staffing decisions!?

To get to the bottom (or top rather) of where this particular buck stops, and also to get as far away from this woman as possible, we head to the manager's office.

Well, eventually. First we stopped to talk to a floor supervisor who informed us he didn’t make the schedule. Then we spoke to the department lead who does make the schedule but doesn’t set the hourly budget. After that we called the staff planner at home who told us that while they allocate the hours, they get their budget from the general manager and questioned if this was worth interrupting their dinner over. All that finally led us to our culprit: Store manager Carl Mathers.

Or is he!?

The culprit we mean. Like is he actually the culprit?

“Okay, first off please stop saying ‘culprit’,” says Carl Mathers, whom we spoke with in the back office which we’re told he rarely leaves. “Secondly; you think I have any say in how many hours we give out? No no no, that’s decided at the district level. Yes, I can choose what resources go to which area of the store, but I don’t set the budget. Furthermore–”

Like many of the workers in his employ, we have stopped listening to Mathers as this back office is a dead end, and not just for the GM’s career.

No, it seems that to locate the source of Irene Wright’s frustration we’ll need to head to the Chicago district office.

After an hour drive, we find ourselves in the office suite of All-In-One Midwest and in the office of district manager Matt Carlson.

“Yes, I oversee several stores in the midwest region,” says Carlson through a thick mustache that could probably use a trim. “Now what can I do for you today?”

We explain what’s-her-name’s complaint (Francine something?) and that tracing the route of her issue has led us right to his desk.

“So Mathers over in store 986 is passing the buck on up to me, huh?” muses Carlson. “Guess he forgot that goes against the All-In-One tenets of accepting responsibility. Think it might be time his store gets a little unannounced visit….”

So were we misled that Mathers isn’t really responsible for staff budgeting?

“Well no,” he says, “but we don’t like complaints such as those to even make it this high, that’s why we have store managers to begin with. They're upper management's Kevlar vest against that stuff reaching us.”

So then you are the responsible party then?

“I do give Mathers the budget for his store’s operations, yes,” says Carlson, “but I don’t make those numbers up. I get those from the corporate office, the staff relations department.”

Wait, does that mean you’re just another buck-passing middleman and don’t really do anything but act as a buffer between the store managers and corporate office?

“Not exactly, it’s complicated,” says Carlson. “You see–”

Okay, there’s no reason to keep listening to this guy now.

After hitting another dead-end manager’s office, we decide to hop a short flight to Colorado Springs, where the company’s main headquarters are located. It’s there we speak with Maryanne Driscoll who heads the Staff Relations department.

“Honestly,” says Driscoll, “It’s really the CFO who–”

Yeah yeah yeah, what floor’s his office on?

“So this isn’t something that Carlson and Mathers were able to handle for you?” says CFO Keith Miller after coming out of his office to see who his secretary was arguing with. “Maybe the stores in that district, especially Burbank, could use a visit. But I understand the concern. Our employees represent us to our valued customers and therefore should be available and willing to help at all times.”

We explain that the issue isn’t whether the employees are being helpful enough but that there aren’t enough available.

“Well,” he says with a heavy exhale, “we are finding ourselves in need of tightening our belts lately, nothing to do about that. And while I do oversee the whole operation financially, I can’t authorize any additional spending on staffing that hasn’t been approved by the shareholders. It’s really them who decide what resources we have to allocate around.”

Oh for fuck’s sake.

“The best I can do for you–”

Shut up, you’re useless.

We manage to find a disgruntled office worker who says he’s days away from being laid off who helps us initiate a Zoom conference with the corporation’s primary shareholders in the hopes to finally get an answer to this burning question even though we can no longer remember why we’re doing that.

I ask several boxed faces on the monitor why there isn’t more staff to help Irene Wright (that’s why we’re doing this!) find the oven mitts or whatever in the Burbank All-In-One location.

Investor Tim Healy is the first to speak up.

“I think if all of those managers couldn’t satisfactorily answer this concern then maybe it’s time to look into whether we need them at all, the CFO, included.”

Okay, whatever, but it is all of you who decide on staffing budgets, correct?

“Well, not directly of course,” explains Healy, “but we do decide how much profits get shared amongst us, how much goes into executive bonuses, and whatever’s left goes back into operating budgets. So in a way, yes.”

Cool, so then you can maybe push a little more back into the company, some of which would go into staff budgeting, and that way someone will actually be available to help customers in Burbank store 986, yes?

“Maybe in theory,” says Healy, who appears to be conferencing in from a large yacht, “but with the economy the way it is, there just isn't any extra to trickle down to them right now.”

The heads in the other Zoom boxes nod in agreement.

“I mean,” continues Healy, “if people wanted to start spending again and if the property holding company we also own were willing to ease up on rents a little then maybe, but still probably not. Sorry, pal, this is just how capitalism works and the line can’t go up if the shit doesn’t roll downhill.”

Yes but surely–

“Sorry, we're all very important and have other matters at hand.”

The conference call is ended unceremoniously.

Well, it seems our journey ends here as we're not about to track down Gerome Powell and ask why the economy won't allow retail stores to hire on any additional staff. As always, the onus of the capitalist system rolls down hill, but unfortunately the complaints and consequences of that system do not roll back up.

We returned to the Burbank All-In-One, a bit dejected, to give Irene Wright the news that there's nobody to blame for the lack of customer service reps but capitalism itself.

We find her in a different section of the store, now yelling at a completely different employee.

“This is absolutely ridiculous!” she shouts. “Why is it every time I come in here the prices have gotten even higher than before!? Don't you know people can't afford this crap!?”

“Lady, I'm with ya,” says the sales worker, “but I don't have any control over the prices. For that you'd need to talk to–”

Uh, actually maybe just accept responsibility for this one, trust me.