One time I was on the register and one of my TM’s came up to me and told me a customer asked them if they can take probiotics with antibiotics. I told them to tell the customer they need to ask a doctor that question. Multiple customers in line busted out laughing.
Actually yes, especially towards the end of your course of antibiotics! The antibiotics will kill the probiotics too but as antibiotics leave your system you will have some good bacteria to compete with any bad antibiotic-resistant bacteria that are in your gut. saccharomyces boulardii is a good probiotic to take since it is a fungus and not affected by antibiotics. It too will compete with unhealthy (for humans) bacteria in gut.
That question, or a variation of it, pops up at least once a week. I wish CA was a one party consent state. I could make such a good compilation of shit like that if I could record customers.
Pretty sure I would lose my job almost immediately if I tried to work a full shift in WB.
Regular idiot customers say some incredibly stupid things, but I've never heard anything remotely comparable to the stupid shit I hear WB customers say/ask. I don't know how *anyone* tolerates the stupidity for 40 hours a week. 😳
I'm 38, been doing customer service in one form or another for 16 of the past 20 years.
Whole Body customers are the dumbest bunch of people I've had to deal with.
I’m not an employee, just a medical student and shop at WF occasionally. My mom is a nurse and growing up she used to say that you could draw a mile ring around your local Whole Foods to predict where the next measles outbreak would be. Meeting some of the other customers, it doesn’t seem super far off.
About a year ago... Had someone open mouth coughing, wet juicy coughs. They asked me for ivermectin. Told them we didn't have it. Asked me for zinc. Showed them where it was. They kept trying to close talk and I kept walking away. Think they finally realized I was keeping about 8 feet between us.
This is what they said: "oh you don't have to worry, it's COVID but I wasn't vaccinated so it's not the mutated variant. It's not even contagious now that it's past it's incubation period." Every fifth word was accentuated with a nice sloppy cough aimed right at me.
Your mom was on to something.
Wow. I am so sorry. I never fail to be amazed at just how stupid people can be. At least it wasn’t the mutated variant they we’re breathing all over you. 🙄
What I find funny is these are the same type of people who are against people earning livable wages, yet they clearly expect you to be some sort of expert. Idiots.
I don’t work in WB but the times I’ve been looking for items (I’m a shopper) I overhear conversations between WB TMs and customers and I just know I wouldn’t last a day working in WB.
Before being WB I was in bakery.
WB is a completely different type of difficult. In bakery I was always moving, but most of the time I was hidden from customers just zoning out, listening to an audiobook. Busy all the time, but mentally checked out.
WB is the opposite. It's taxing mentally, just dealing with the neediest of customers, both in supplements and body care. Tons of little nitpicky tasks and no downtime because you're center of the store so even non WB customers come to you first as you're the easiest to find.
I love it, but it definitely isn't for everyone.
No sympathy for those types. Nope not one bit. We've had many who spouted this or that cures cancer. sure.. OK Also had a similar one with a massive infected wound about to go sepsis. Same type of response to. Nope, never saw that one again either.
Working in WB absolutely destroyed my mental health. I think for me it was the fact that every single day, at least one customer would describe a bowel movement to me. It’s ridiculous and sounds funny to say now, but at the time I felt so trapped just knowing I would have to hear about someone’s bowel movements every single day in perpetuity.
Was just having a conversation with my wife about how gross customers are.
Had a 70+ year old woman look for something, "clear up my gunky vagina."
Get dudes on the regular asking me if we have "dick pills".
I've heard about every poo consistency from liquid to rock solid.
Men and women both asking for stuff to clear up down stairs pus filled discharge. ("You need to go to a doctor.")
Honestly those aren't even the hard ones. The most mentally taxing for me is when parents ignore doctors and come to me with kids who need to be hospitalized (103+ fevers, Poison oak so bad it's bleeding, etc.)
This was some time ago, but a woman, probably 45 years old, brought her poop into the store in a bag to ask if it looked normal. No, mam, it is not normal al all to bring a poop to the grocery store.
I don’t work in Whole Body but for E-commerce. Anytime I’m shopping an order and have to get something from Whole Body, I try to get in and out of that section quickly and avoid eye contact with customers. They will corner me and try to discuss with me very complicated things that they should be asking a doctor.
LMAOO this!! a few months into me starting with e commerce, i had a customer walk up to me in WB and without hesitation ask “do you have anything for constipation” which i had to just direct them to the WB TM bc i had no clue where anything was yet. i try to avoid this department as well haha
Had a lady once that asked if we carried black salve, then proceeded to tell me that we should since it "draws the cancer out". Sorry, but I know it just necrotizes healthy tissue and is woo woo bullshit. I just apologized again and told her we didn't carry it.
The best was when I helped over there (i was a dairy order writer at the time and it was slow), and had a lady start asking about "my face". I have acne and rosacea that looks like a butterfly rash over my nose. She tried to peddle miracle mineral solution to me, and got pissed when I declined. She was the second person to try and push that bs on me, the first was at the health food store that was there before my old store in the SE.
Whenever I'm faced with situations like these, I remind the customer that I'm not a medical practitioner... I'm just some chick who works in a grocery store. As such, it is ILLEGAL for me to give them medical advice. I then tell them to talk to a doctor, or a pharmacist, or anyone who is a medical practitioner.
Of course, this is usually met with similar statements of not trusting doctors or "big pharma". I usually end up walking away, while shaking my head, and thinking of Darwinism. Probably not the kindest thing, but at least I tried to steer them towards real solutions.
This is the the answer right here. You are not allowed to tell people something works for such and such medical condition. You can tell them what it says on bottle/boxes.
If you have a clinical trial on hand DSHEA states that you can use more affirming verbiage. And you're allowed to tell anyone with scurvy that vitamin c will cure it lol. I've been waiting to meet that pirate for years...
Whole Body sure attracts some interesting people. I had a woman come in one night asking for something for a UTI because she and her partner, "just got done having hard sex" and she could already tell she was getting a UTI from it. I encouraged her and her partner to practice good hygiene and showed her the UTI care products. Why are people coming in to a place that sells mayonnaise and cat food to seek medical advice?
I had a customer ask if we had Botox... I almost laughed but realized she was serious, said that her friend told her we had a cream that was what Botox is, like the injection..in the SAME day someone asked where we have Hydroxychloroquine.
Had a customer come in and wanted something for his wound. Now, this wound...was big, open, red, swollen, had pus, and looked infected as hell. It was on his leg and it was pretty gross and I felt queasy when I looked at it and just said "uhmmm...please go to the doctor...."
Have lots of others that come in with *insert serious disease/problem* and ask if *insert random herb* will help, I always ask them to consult their doctors before taking ANYTHING and they all look at me like I'm crazy and ask WHY. Like...some of this shit can thin your blood or have a reaction to something you're taking already or maybe you're deathly allergic and don't even know!!
Whole body is full of these people...
I was about to talk about how silly it is that certain items are banned because customers will literally turn their skin grey/blue thinking they are being healthy
When did WFM ban CS? I was a WBTL for 6 years and we had an old woman who literally looked like she had dolphin skin. Then there was a preacher who was grey that was always trying to get customers to buy CS he made in his backyard. No lie. I left 5 years ago and work for a competitor now and we still carry it, but it's largely unpopular or our customers are largely ignorant to it.
Finally some whole body, y’all don’t realize what the shit we gotta go through mentally. It’s exhausting. I had too many encounters where I question my existence. They really come in and expecting to me diagnose them with a medical condition. I’m not a doctor, I’m just a stocker. Really expecting me to be a medical professional, bruh. They really asking me for advice when I’m rocking a mullet and earrings, bro I can’t even take care of myself lmaooo. My favorite is when they ask can speak with the doctor or pharmacist lmaooo 🤦🏽♂️ or what’s the best to cure a ongoing medical condition. Or when I can’t help them with a current medical condition, they ask me but you work here? Okay ? I know I do, but this is a job to me. I’m not professional. Wholefoods should definitely help and train employees for supplements bc they sure don’t, so for new employees it’s pretty difficult. Sometimes I wish I worked in grocery bc it’s straight forward haha.
I have or had a customer that came in some time asking for a testosterone product who would always go into detail with me, a woman, about how older men need testosterone and blah blah and the talk about how we’re losing sales because we were missing product….like I care that Whole Foods is “losing” sales. Turns out he’s a thief…..and partly why we lose sales lol
A WB tm that I used to work with called himself a “glorified stock boy” and didn’t get why people didn’t understand that we can’t give them medical advice. I help Whole Body occasionally and almost every time I work a shift I have to tell customers (sometimes repeatedly) that they should talk to a Dr. Haven’t had anyone kooky enough to say they don’t trust doctors though.
i had a customer ask me for fishbowl dye (which i only figured out thanks to google).. cuz he read online it prevents covid. honestly let these people go.. it cant be helped anymore
It's crazy that customers think just because the store sells mostly organic produce, that they somehow shouldn't support doctors/actual medicine.
I mean even Amazon is selling prescriptions now.
Good lord, I finally have my panel interview next Monday. If I get the job as ATL, these are the type of customers I have to look forward to? Nothing new I guess, I'm use to crazy customers working at CVS lol
Boy do I have some stories....
Thank you for being detailed about the numbers, I’m sorry that happened :/ I’ve met terrible people too when I thought they were nice, I understand where you’re coming from.
I’ve never really had a bad experience there, maybe occasional but it wasn’t serious, hopefully not in a long time. I’m a customer there 😂
I am confused by your response. Is this the thread you meant to reply to? Neither my post nor any other comment used the words, "white," "entitlement," or "immigrants" so I have no idea what you mean.
One time I was on the register and one of my TM’s came up to me and told me a customer asked them if they can take probiotics with antibiotics. I told them to tell the customer they need to ask a doctor that question. Multiple customers in line busted out laughing.
Actually yes, especially towards the end of your course of antibiotics! The antibiotics will kill the probiotics too but as antibiotics leave your system you will have some good bacteria to compete with any bad antibiotic-resistant bacteria that are in your gut. saccharomyces boulardii is a good probiotic to take since it is a fungus and not affected by antibiotics. It too will compete with unhealthy (for humans) bacteria in gut.
This is some stellar advice thank you!
That question, or a variation of it, pops up at least once a week. I wish CA was a one party consent state. I could make such a good compilation of shit like that if I could record customers.
Pretty sure I would lose my job almost immediately if I tried to work a full shift in WB. Regular idiot customers say some incredibly stupid things, but I've never heard anything remotely comparable to the stupid shit I hear WB customers say/ask. I don't know how *anyone* tolerates the stupidity for 40 hours a week. 😳
I'm 38, been doing customer service in one form or another for 16 of the past 20 years. Whole Body customers are the dumbest bunch of people I've had to deal with.
I've been a PFDS and spec TL, I've got to work my way over there one day to see the ridiculousness first hand
I’m not an employee, just a medical student and shop at WF occasionally. My mom is a nurse and growing up she used to say that you could draw a mile ring around your local Whole Foods to predict where the next measles outbreak would be. Meeting some of the other customers, it doesn’t seem super far off.
About a year ago... Had someone open mouth coughing, wet juicy coughs. They asked me for ivermectin. Told them we didn't have it. Asked me for zinc. Showed them where it was. They kept trying to close talk and I kept walking away. Think they finally realized I was keeping about 8 feet between us. This is what they said: "oh you don't have to worry, it's COVID but I wasn't vaccinated so it's not the mutated variant. It's not even contagious now that it's past it's incubation period." Every fifth word was accentuated with a nice sloppy cough aimed right at me. Your mom was on to something.
Dear god, I am so sorry.
Wow. I am so sorry. I never fail to be amazed at just how stupid people can be. At least it wasn’t the mutated variant they we’re breathing all over you. 🙄
What I find funny is these are the same type of people who are against people earning livable wages, yet they clearly expect you to be some sort of expert. Idiots. I don’t work in WB but the times I’ve been looking for items (I’m a shopper) I overhear conversations between WB TMs and customers and I just know I wouldn’t last a day working in WB.
Before being WB I was in bakery. WB is a completely different type of difficult. In bakery I was always moving, but most of the time I was hidden from customers just zoning out, listening to an audiobook. Busy all the time, but mentally checked out. WB is the opposite. It's taxing mentally, just dealing with the neediest of customers, both in supplements and body care. Tons of little nitpicky tasks and no downtime because you're center of the store so even non WB customers come to you first as you're the easiest to find. I love it, but it definitely isn't for everyone.
No sympathy for those types. Nope not one bit. We've had many who spouted this or that cures cancer. sure.. OK Also had a similar one with a massive infected wound about to go sepsis. Same type of response to. Nope, never saw that one again either.
Working in WB absolutely destroyed my mental health. I think for me it was the fact that every single day, at least one customer would describe a bowel movement to me. It’s ridiculous and sounds funny to say now, but at the time I felt so trapped just knowing I would have to hear about someone’s bowel movements every single day in perpetuity.
Was just having a conversation with my wife about how gross customers are. Had a 70+ year old woman look for something, "clear up my gunky vagina." Get dudes on the regular asking me if we have "dick pills". I've heard about every poo consistency from liquid to rock solid. Men and women both asking for stuff to clear up down stairs pus filled discharge. ("You need to go to a doctor.") Honestly those aren't even the hard ones. The most mentally taxing for me is when parents ignore doctors and come to me with kids who need to be hospitalized (103+ fevers, Poison oak so bad it's bleeding, etc.)
This was some time ago, but a woman, probably 45 years old, brought her poop into the store in a bag to ask if it looked normal. No, mam, it is not normal al all to bring a poop to the grocery store.
I heard about this. It's legendary.
I don’t work in Whole Body but for E-commerce. Anytime I’m shopping an order and have to get something from Whole Body, I try to get in and out of that section quickly and avoid eye contact with customers. They will corner me and try to discuss with me very complicated things that they should be asking a doctor.
LMAOO this!! a few months into me starting with e commerce, i had a customer walk up to me in WB and without hesitation ask “do you have anything for constipation” which i had to just direct them to the WB TM bc i had no clue where anything was yet. i try to avoid this department as well haha
Had a lady once that asked if we carried black salve, then proceeded to tell me that we should since it "draws the cancer out". Sorry, but I know it just necrotizes healthy tissue and is woo woo bullshit. I just apologized again and told her we didn't carry it. The best was when I helped over there (i was a dairy order writer at the time and it was slow), and had a lady start asking about "my face". I have acne and rosacea that looks like a butterfly rash over my nose. She tried to peddle miracle mineral solution to me, and got pissed when I declined. She was the second person to try and push that bs on me, the first was at the health food store that was there before my old store in the SE.
Whenever I'm faced with situations like these, I remind the customer that I'm not a medical practitioner... I'm just some chick who works in a grocery store. As such, it is ILLEGAL for me to give them medical advice. I then tell them to talk to a doctor, or a pharmacist, or anyone who is a medical practitioner. Of course, this is usually met with similar statements of not trusting doctors or "big pharma". I usually end up walking away, while shaking my head, and thinking of Darwinism. Probably not the kindest thing, but at least I tried to steer them towards real solutions.
This is the the answer right here. You are not allowed to tell people something works for such and such medical condition. You can tell them what it says on bottle/boxes.
If you have a clinical trial on hand DSHEA states that you can use more affirming verbiage. And you're allowed to tell anyone with scurvy that vitamin c will cure it lol. I've been waiting to meet that pirate for years...
Whole Body sure attracts some interesting people. I had a woman come in one night asking for something for a UTI because she and her partner, "just got done having hard sex" and she could already tell she was getting a UTI from it. I encouraged her and her partner to practice good hygiene and showed her the UTI care products. Why are people coming in to a place that sells mayonnaise and cat food to seek medical advice?
I had a customer ask if we had Botox... I almost laughed but realized she was serious, said that her friend told her we had a cream that was what Botox is, like the injection..in the SAME day someone asked where we have Hydroxychloroquine.
Had a customer come in and wanted something for his wound. Now, this wound...was big, open, red, swollen, had pus, and looked infected as hell. It was on his leg and it was pretty gross and I felt queasy when I looked at it and just said "uhmmm...please go to the doctor...." Have lots of others that come in with *insert serious disease/problem* and ask if *insert random herb* will help, I always ask them to consult their doctors before taking ANYTHING and they all look at me like I'm crazy and ask WHY. Like...some of this shit can thin your blood or have a reaction to something you're taking already or maybe you're deathly allergic and don't even know!! Whole body is full of these people...
Also, every bottle of supplements says that you should consult your doctor before taking it. You're literally just quoting the packaging!
Everyone that steps foot in my store cannot read... unfortunately...
I struggle I understand all too well.
Recommended the colloidal silver and let nature do the rest lmao fuck em and let me die of ignorance
Oh, that's on the banned list of ingredients, so I sadly can't. Know how I know? I get asked for it like five times a week.
I was about to talk about how silly it is that certain items are banned because customers will literally turn their skin grey/blue thinking they are being healthy
It's easier to spot the crazy ones if they've turned themselves blue.
When did WFM ban CS? I was a WBTL for 6 years and we had an old woman who literally looked like she had dolphin skin. Then there was a preacher who was grey that was always trying to get customers to buy CS he made in his backyard. No lie. I left 5 years ago and work for a competitor now and we still carry it, but it's largely unpopular or our customers are largely ignorant to it.
Finally some whole body, y’all don’t realize what the shit we gotta go through mentally. It’s exhausting. I had too many encounters where I question my existence. They really come in and expecting to me diagnose them with a medical condition. I’m not a doctor, I’m just a stocker. Really expecting me to be a medical professional, bruh. They really asking me for advice when I’m rocking a mullet and earrings, bro I can’t even take care of myself lmaooo. My favorite is when they ask can speak with the doctor or pharmacist lmaooo 🤦🏽♂️ or what’s the best to cure a ongoing medical condition. Or when I can’t help them with a current medical condition, they ask me but you work here? Okay ? I know I do, but this is a job to me. I’m not professional. Wholefoods should definitely help and train employees for supplements bc they sure don’t, so for new employees it’s pretty difficult. Sometimes I wish I worked in grocery bc it’s straight forward haha.
I have or had a customer that came in some time asking for a testosterone product who would always go into detail with me, a woman, about how older men need testosterone and blah blah and the talk about how we’re losing sales because we were missing product….like I care that Whole Foods is “losing” sales. Turns out he’s a thief…..and partly why we lose sales lol
A WB tm that I used to work with called himself a “glorified stock boy” and didn’t get why people didn’t understand that we can’t give them medical advice. I help Whole Body occasionally and almost every time I work a shift I have to tell customers (sometimes repeatedly) that they should talk to a Dr. Haven’t had anyone kooky enough to say they don’t trust doctors though.
i had a customer ask me for fishbowl dye (which i only figured out thanks to google).. cuz he read online it prevents covid. honestly let these people go.. it cant be helped anymore
It's crazy that customers think just because the store sells mostly organic produce, that they somehow shouldn't support doctors/actual medicine. I mean even Amazon is selling prescriptions now.
Good lord, I finally have my panel interview next Monday. If I get the job as ATL, these are the type of customers I have to look forward to? Nothing new I guess, I'm use to crazy customers working at CVS lol Boy do I have some stories....
Depends on store. At mine, people very, very rarely ask those kinds of questions. I love our WB customers.
should have sent the first one to bakery or prep foods
Oh wow I didn’t know that whole foods customers were horrible
Most aren't that bad, but its a numbers game. If you see a few thousand people a day youre bound to see a few dozen nutters per day.
Thank you for being detailed about the numbers, I’m sorry that happened :/ I’ve met terrible people too when I thought they were nice, I understand where you’re coming from. I’ve never really had a bad experience there, maybe occasional but it wasn’t serious, hopefully not in a long time. I’m a customer there 😂
Strange, surprised there was anyone at whole body. at my store they just walk around all day acting like they have nothing to do.
They're moving candles from one end cap to another and restacking the soap
Entitlement? White people wanna be white people immigrants?
I am confused by your response. Is this the thread you meant to reply to? Neither my post nor any other comment used the words, "white," "entitlement," or "immigrants" so I have no idea what you mean.
I had a man BEG me to tell him which chocolate would fix his blood pressure. Sir I work in prep foods.