I Worked At Value Village For 5 Months & Here Are 6 Things I Would Never Do

Shop there anytime near Halloween

Some of you may say "But, Halloween is the best at Value Village!" Don't get me wrong, it is if you don't work there. If you do, it's just a chaotic group of weeks where you get wig hair and glitter all over you.

I've never been able to separate work stressors from life. Almost ten years have passed since I last worked there, and I still get anxious walking by one when I see the Halloween decorations go up.

All I can think about is untangling dusty costumes in the back of a delivery truck.

Although my co-workers really did seem to enjoy it though, so maybe I'm just jaded.

Walk into one five minutes before it closes

I closed most shifts I worked at Value Village, and every night, without fail, I would have to go around the store and kick at least five people out for loitering after hours.

These are people who would watch us fully cash out our registers and still have the gall to ask if they could buy something.

I'm so afraid to subject anyone else to this utter annoyance that I still — to this day — feel like a jerk anytime I step into a business that's less than an hour from closing.

Donate pants without checking the pockets

You'd be shocked how many people donate pants that are full of money.

Part of my duties as a Value Village employee was to help move my store's clothing donations off our delivery trucks and into the store.

The first time I ever did this, a co-worker I had never met turned to me and said, "always check the pockets. People find $20 bills in them all the time."

I was pretty sure that what he was referring to was against store policy, so I never took his advice. But, it did teach me a good lesson about the importance of diligence.

No iPhones in the washer for me.

Not put clothes back on the hanger

Look, there's an irony in saying I hate people that do this because they're one of the reasons I had a job in the first place.

But I watched way too many entitled people drop clothes on the ground after they were done looking at them to give customers the benefit of the doubt.

If you don't have the decency to put clothes back on a hanger after you take them off, you need a serious attitude adjustment.

Let my nieces and nephews destroy the toy section

Parents, I know you're tired, but so is the 19-year-old kid who's been walking around Value Village all day like a laundry pilgrim.

So, I think that's a pretty bogus reason to let your kids treat the used toy section like it's their personal playroom.

"Let them play! It'll give you and them something to do," a mother of two rowdy kids once told me.

I cleaned up so many thrown-about toys working there that I started developing dad-back in my late teens.

Ask employees if they have a specific shirt in stock

This is a harder hill to die on. I'll admit that right now. But, as a former Value Village employee, I can tell you for a fact that I had no idea what our stock looked like.

I mean, I knew where the sizes and colours were, but I couldn't tell you where a 90's batman shirt would be.

Seriously, that's how specific people got with their requests.

I literally had to find a customer-friendly way to say, "how the hell should I know?" every shift I worked there.

It's called bargain hunting for a reason, folks. You've got to find the treasures within the store. That's the deal!