Stinky customers

[Lace Neil Singer]

Not making this thread to be mean, just wondered what's the worst smell you've ever encountered in a customer? For me, it would be the crazy old lady who used to come in the garden centre to buy cat food; she stank of wee and I used to feel physically ill after serving her. Plus there's all the BO ridden customers, and the ones who seem as tho they bathe in liquid tabacco.

[BigPete]

I've had one rip Arse in my ticket office.


He didn't even excuse himself.

[Rubystars]

Well as I mentioned in another thread, I don't have a very good sense of smell. Unless someone smells really awful, I won't notice it.

When I worked at Target as a seasonal employee, there was a woman who I saw walking toward my register, and a man following her several feet behind.

I wondered why he was standing so far away from her. Then when she came up to my register, the smell hit me like a ton of bricks! She smelled like a used maxi pad and a filthy bathroom mixed together. To top it off, she raised up her shirt, and scratched her belly.

I realized now why the man with her wouldn't walk next to her.

I was really glad I'd brought some vanilla perfume with me to work and I sprayed the area around the register with it as soon as she was gone! I didn't want anyone to think that smell was coming off me. The next customer coming up saw me spraying and I told him "I'm sorry, the customer before you smelled really bad."

[Lace Neil Singer]

I wish I didn't have such a good sense of smell sometimes. :lol:

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

I've had one rip Arse in my ticket office.


He didn't even excuse himself.

I was in Target one time, and a woman walking down the aisle in front of me ripped a big, juicy fart right in front of me.

To be fair, she did excuse herself.

I ducked down another aisle so she wouldn't see me giggling like a schoolgirl.

[blas]

I was doing a "store sweep" (where we took the gigantic broom and swept up and down every aisle in the grocery store and all over every department) one Sunday......you can see where this is going...

About the time when the church crowds started taking over the grocery store....

I'm sweeping behind this old couple in the chip/soda aisle. I must have been really quiet, because they had no clue I was around, and the lady lifted up her leg and ripped a fart that sounded almost like a trumpet solo..........

I immediately covered my mouth and froze in place. I thought I was going to have a seizure because I couldn't stop myself from shaking and wanting to laugh, but I had to keep quiet (and "invisible") until they went to the next aisle.

[Jack T. Chance]

At my most recent job (which I lost about a week ago) at an outlet shoe store, we'd occasionally have customers... grown adults, mind you... come in smelling like a kid's diaper that was full of poo!!! :wtf:

Luckily, we usually had a can of Febreze air freshener in the back room (with a nice, minty fragrance... I was the one that bought the air freshener! :D ), so on a few occasions, I had to walk down an aisle, spraying that behind me to get rid of the smell. I swear, some of these people shat themselves and just kept on shopping! :rolleyes:

I only wish I'd had a nice big package of Oops! I Crapped My Pants! Undergarments to give them as a not-so-subtle hint! :devil:

[XCashier]

Not making this thread to be mean, just wondered what's the worst smell you've ever encountered in a customer?
Okay, you asked for it. I shall now attempt to describe the worst-smelling customer I have ever encountered. Those of you who are faint-of-stomach, consider yourself warned.

I was working at the Novelty Store in the Run-Down Mall. One evening, right before closing, this huge guy with filthy clothes and greasy hair came into the store, walked around for a bit, and left. He smelled so awful the stench lingered for an hour after he left.

How bad did he smell? Picture this: imagine a butcher shop, abandoned at the beginning of an extremely hot summer, electricity shut off, meat still hanging off the hooks. Now go back six months later and take a deep breath of the place. He smelled even worse than that!!! :puke: :puke: :puke:

Honestly, how do people not know they reek?! If you can lube your car by rubbing your head against the engine block, if birds and insects fall to the ground dead when you walk past (Why do birds fall out of the sky / Every time you walk by / Just like me, they want to be / Far from you)* , if a phrase you hear several times a day is "Holy s***, what IS that smell?!" then take a bath already! With deodorant soap and shampoo! And brush your teeth while you're at it (yes, you have to use toothpaste!)

*with apologies to The Carpenters ;)

[kerrisan]

Oh, I've got a doozy.

It was bout 9 at night and the store was pretty quiet. Suddenly I'm hit with a wave of something disgusting; it smelled like roadkill. Seriously. I wave it off but it comes back 10X as strong when a homely-looking gentleman with a few cans of air freshener comes to my line. My eye start watering and I can hardly breathe. I put two and two together and realize why the smell reminds me of roadkill: it's the smell you smell when a certain black animal with a white stripe down its back has been hit by a car.

You guessed it: the man has been sprayed by a skunk!

He doesn't look too pleased, so I just say nothing and ring him up. Finally he says, "I think there's a skunk under my deck." I'm thinking 'no sh*t Sherlock!' but I want to make polite conversation so I say "oh, that's no good." So he continues with "I think he got me, too. You can't smell it, can you?" Well I don't want to lie but I also want to hurt his feeling so I say "oh, it's not that bad." He continues with, "I don't think I'll be able to get this smell out, either. I've tried everything!" And I, in all my idiocy, respond with:

"Oh, that stinks." :doh:

Argh. I hope he didn't catch that. Well, after he left we had to shut down my line and the two before and after it. And everybody -employees and customers- was complaining about the smell. Horrible. I'm not angry at the guy, but I just wish he's sprayed himself with cologne or something to at least TRY to hide the stench!:puke:

[LostMyMind]

Finally he says, "I think there's a skunk under my deck." I'm thinking 'no sh*t Sherlock!' but I want to make polite conversation so I say "oh, that's no good." So he continues with "I think he got me, too. You can't smell it, can you?"
Once you get hit by a skunk spray, the first 10 mins or so you smell it. After that, your nose shut-down. It was probably a faint smell to him by that time.

But man, how did he get in the store without someone noticing is my question? Gee, that one reason I'll do personal shopping for someone, "You get spray by a skunk. I'll get the stuff for you, stay right there, outside." Aisles should have been emptying, customers running for fresh air, dog yelping...

[RecoveringKinkoid]

Had a guy that chain smoked. I'm sure he was not my only chain smoking customer, but picture the funk of a thousand dirty ashtrays in a bar somewhere, that never got washed. Now picture them damp.

The guy had grey skin. Frankly, I'm not sure how he could be alive. Surely his lungs stopped functioning years ago.

I am not exaggerating when I say he made my eyes water and my sinus close up.:( Seriously, the funk could stop your breath in your throat.

[Imogene]

The guy had grey skin. Frankly, I'm not sure how he could be alive. Surely his lungs stopped functioning years ago.

Big, shiny black eyes?
Holy crap, Kinkoid, you've been visited by the Greys!
*looks around for the men in black*

[RecoveringKinkoid]

:lol: Don't think that hadn't occured to me!:lol:

[Tria]

I'm not angry at the guy, but I just wish he's sprayed himself with cologne or something to at least TRY to hide the stench!:puke:

Glad you're not angry, I mean....Well, I personally LIKE skunky smell but it does stick with you. Granted, um, the one time I got close to a skunk, I backed up quick, I may like the smell but I'm in the minority.

[Mighty Girl]

I'm a SAHM now, which has taken me a lot of time to get used to. I've worked from age 17 until 32 when my daughter was born.

One of the biggest changes in my life is that I'm at the store at the same time as all the retired people- who apparently can't smell to save their life. I don't know how many times I've walked through a cloud of a severe stench- a mixture of body odor, bengay and who knows what else. It takes all I've got to not just hurl right there. And now my daughter is talking! :eek:

In case you didn't know, kids don't hold back. She'll say "Mommy he's stinky", and then proceed to ask me why he's stinky, who is he, etc. One part of me agrees and is proud that she's forming sentences, the other part of me wants to disappear into the earth...

Edited to add: something to consider, some people are stinky on purpose. A lot of people at my old jobs would totally intrude on my space, so I'd make sure to eat something with onions and garlic for lunch sometimes just to keep them away.

[Demonoid Phenomenon]

I've had several run-ins with stinky customers.
When I worked for a certain "all items a dollar" chain, there was a family of walking stinkbombs who came in a few times. I'm talking BO for YEARS after they left. My manager emptied a can of air freshener each time they left out of the store.
Another customer (same store) came in one morning and walked past one of the cashiers. The cashier got this look on her face I won't easily forget. After the lady left, the cashier told me that the woman smelled like she had just rolled in poo and BOY was it rank. I took her word for it.

More recently, a 'gentleman' came into my store and tried to haggle over the price of a bottle of cologne, telling me that I can mark it down for him if I wanted to. Uh, yeah, and lose my job, too, thank you very not. The whole time he's standing there bugging me, I'm slowly sufficating from his pronounced stink. I wanted to tell him that cologne wasn't the answer; deodorant was.

[purplecat41877]

There's this guy who does lottery who smells bad. I can tell that the smell is really bad since I have a bad nose and can't smell things unless they're strong-scented or I put my nose close to it.:eek:

[Enjis]

And then there are the young men who visit the cologne counter at my place, and douse themselves from head to toe with the stuff. The ladies who work that counter say that usually it's the men who just come from the gym, and don't bother taking showers.
So, it's cool to cover up the BO with a bucket of cologne!!
Urgh....I'm glad my fiance does not wear cologne...I can't stand it.
Sometimes, it's so bad, I can follow a customer around by following the trail left in the air...seriously! And I don't have a very good sense of smell either!

[Lehk]

I can follow a customer around by following the trail left in the air...seriously! And I don't have a very good sense of smell either!

one of my cow-orkers i can identify as being at work without seeing her she wears so much perfume and always the same one (i don't know what it's called)

i'll walk into the back room and think "Hmm, F must be working today"

don't see her much anymore i think she pissed off everyone in the department by being lazy and annoying.

[Kiwi]

my first customer, ever.

she was a huge beast wearing a red moo moo (im not kidding) her skin was dry and scaley and she smelt like urine.... layers of dried old urine

underneath her long yellow fingernails was black gunk, she was the most disgusting person I have ever laid eyes on... and she was my first customer (nasty cow to) lucky my trainer was still there... eyes bugging out of his head

should have taken it as an omen and run!

[Hotelboy]

My worst was waaay back when I used to work housekeeping. Went up to clean a check-out room on a sunday morning, 15 minutes past check-out time. *Knock knock*, they were still there. Front desk finally got them out by 2 o'clock. When I opened the door, :wtf: :puke: :runaway: all the way down the hall. Now not only do I have to clean 'my' mess, I still have to find out whats making that stench.

Apparently the previous occupants was/were hooker(s) (I speculate cause it couldn't have been just one). I wrapped a deoderizer sprayed towel around my face and searched for the source of the stench. OH MY GOD!

Bathroom garbage can..... half full.... of used CONDOMS! :puke:

How? Just how in the hell do you go through that many? Were they lined up all night?

I checked with front desk (while telling them we're putting the room off market and hiring pro's to clean it). These people checked in at 11:30pm. They were only awake for 12 hours max. Using some approximate math... about 150 condoms in that can = about 12.5 an hour? EEEWWWWW

[RecoveringKinkoid]

Spraying with cologne does not help mask the stench of funk. It makes it worse. I had to work with a guy for the last five years or so who was the nastiest, funkiest, unwashed creature I've ever met (and I don't mind talking trash about him, either, because the guy's smell matched his personality. What a creep.). I had to share a crew office with this guy. He wore cheap cologne, and since he was always unwashed and stinky, the combo of smells would knock you down. I'd rather just smell the BO, frankly. I can live with BO without retching.

He came to work crusted with dirt, too, but that's another story for another time.

Once I was the stinky customer. While working for public television, I worked on the crew for a show called NatureScene. It's a show where a naturalist and a host walk around a place, checking out the local flora and fauna. Great show to work on, had a blast. It was boiling hot, we were in Mexico Beach, covered in sweat and dirt. We filled the van with dead things we'd found to photograph and study...dead sea urchins, scales from porcupine fish, skate vertebrae, etc. The van smelled like the dumpster behind a seafood joint in August. And we had to stop by a CVS to pick up more bug repellant. We smelled like BO, rot, fish, all fermented down to a sickening, ripe funk.

I was glad I was in a town where no one knew me.

[Carolinagirl]

I hate it when women come to my dept, and I swear that they are wearing their whole bottle of perfume.... my God, do they not know that just a squirt or 2 will be okay.... mostly they are older women.... I have to hold my breath with some of them..... one time my eyes started watering, and I started sneezing..... this lady looked at me and asked me if I was catching a cold, I replied.... no maam, it is your perfume.... she stormed off in a huff. :D

[Mongo Skruddgemire]

The worst I've ever had to deal with was at least not a nausating odor, but I did run afoul of the Original AquaVelva Man.

I don't mean someone who wears it, but someone whom I'm certain is either marinated it for several weeks, or has it running through thier veins.

I could actually smell him BEFORE he came into the store and the stink of the aftershave would linger for a bloody week.

Thank Goddess he only came in three or four times a year.

Mongo

[Lace Neil Singer]

The worst I've ever had to deal with was at least not a nausating odor, but I did run afoul of the Original AquaVelva Man.


Quagmire: Hey there spud in the mud.
Stewie: Oh god do you bathe in Aqua Velva?

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

I was doing a "store sweep" (where we took the gigantic broom and swept up and down every aisle in the grocery store and all over every department) one Sunday......you can see where this is going...

About the time when the church crowds started taking over the grocery store....

I'm sweeping behind this old couple in the chip/soda aisle. I must have been really quiet, because they had no clue I was around, and the lady lifted up her leg and ripped a fart that sounded almost like a trumpet solo..........

I immediately covered my mouth and froze in place. I thought I was going to have a seizure because I couldn't stop myself from shaking and wanting to laugh, but I had to keep quiet (and "invisible") until they went to the next aisle.

Aaagh! That's nasty!

If I feel one coming on, I try to get away from everybody else and let it go as quietly as possible. I don't just lift my leg and blast one.

I'm not the type to fart in public on purpose, but sometimes it can't be avoided.:p

[South Texan]

Finally he says, "I think there's a skunk under my deck."

He continues with, "I don't think I'll be able to get this smell out, either. I've tried everything!"
Off topic, but whenever this should happen, the way I've found to remove the smell (or at least a vast majority of it) is to immerse the "victim" to the limit possible without drowning for at least five minutes in a warm bath with a lot of lemon juice, peroxide and baking soda mixed in. The acids in those ingredients will break down the oil that the skunk sprays. Our dogs have encountered skunks too often, so we have a supply of these things on hand now.

The acid in tomato juice can do this too, but that stuff stains.

[Zinjadu]

We have sooo many regular stinky customers it's not even funny!

The 2 slightly 'challenged' brothers who always come in right before closing - urine, BO, bad breath, dirty torn clothing, and they NEVER buy toothpaste, shampoo, deodorant or soap. I always sanitize after they come through. The one night they had kleenex and toilet paper, didn't have enough money, and decided to put back the TP. I tried so hard not to laugh, picturing them not using TP after going #2. (I have an over-active imagination!)

The mother and daughter that reek of urine and BO, who are also somewhat 'challenged'.

The woman who looks like she's about 100 years old and reeks of cigarettes. Her teeth are black stumps, and as soon as she opens her mouth, the stink makes you gag and take a few steps back. :puke: The worst thing is that she always tries to hold long conversations with us.

The middle-aged guy whose breath smells like rotting meat. I hold my breath as much as possible whenever he comes through, and turn to the side to breathe in!

The young woman who works somewhere in the mall and wears so much perfume I almost faint/gag/die/break out in a rash! The smell lingers for a long time after she leaves, too.

Those are some of our worst offenders.

[Cvstos]

Couple of customers I've seen a couple times are real bad. Father and son, no less. Redneck and urkel, only white and fat. BO to the max. It's so bad that their elbows aren't just ashy, they're GREEN.

[Retail_Addict]

I've encountered a couple of really raunchy smelling customers in my nine years of retail.

One of the worst was an old man who was a bit looney...used to come into our store all winter wearing shorts. (This in MN!) He had this obsession with self-tanner, and would go to the cosmetic counter and load up on the stuff. He was so orange it wasn't even funny. Wouldn't have been bad, except for the fact that I doubt he bathed much, because the strong smell of self-tanning lotion and cigarettes was SO strong it lingered forever!

The latest is a woman that comes into my store that has the worst smelling feet ever! When she leaves after trying on clothes, I have to go into the fitting room to retrieve what she doesn't want. I was literally gagging from the stinky feet smell last time she was in. :puke: I swear her sandals are rotting!

[Bugg]

The worst I can remeber was a woman whos breath smelled like rotten salami, really [I]rotten[I], and she wouldn't stop talking, but it clung in the air like tear gas, I used a whole can of Oust in the department I was in at the time.

[Mark Healey]

I'm new here but boy do I have stories. I'm sure they will eventually come up as responses to other threads.

The neighborhood in which I work has a lot of bums. As I'm sure many on this site can attest, it is much easier to give them handles than to learn their names. This is one about one called "Shit Lady".

In the U.S. it is almost impossible to commit someone who isn't an immediate demonstrable threat to themselves or others, no matter how much they are messing themselves up.

This women would steal a wheelchair from a nearby hospital, sit down, and not get up for anything. I mean anything.

One day she comes into the store and starts rolling around. When she rolled past the counter I knew I would have to kick her out as soon as I inhaled. When I approached her she turned around and left before I could get a word out. Yay, an easy one, if only they were all this easy.

A few days later I'm walking past the store (I live a block away from work) and I see a bunch of chairs blocking the front door ,every fan we have blowing air out and the boss working a rented carpet shampooer. I ask what happened and he describes shit lady to me and tells me that her pants were filled up to the waistband and little plops were falling to the floor as she rolled throughout the store.

I'm so glad it was my day off.

[Sir Humphrey]

Many years ago in the early 1990s I worked in a charity shop in Bristol, England. There are numerous stories I could relate about that establishment, but, regarding the topic of "Stinky Customers":

An old lady used to regularly come in to browse and buy. She was eighty if she was a day, and wore clothes that, in their heyday, would probably have been a la mode but were now redolent of shabby grandeur.

She was stick-thin, had a pale, sagging, wrinkly face, and watery blue eyes. And she dribbled constantly and her saliva stank.

It was revolting. I can barely describe it. It smelt like a tin of tuna that had been left out in the sun for a week, and it was the sort of odour that would permeate the inside of your head and insinuate itself into the very fibre of your brain, ensuring that, once smelt, you would NEVER forget it. Even now, some fifteen years later, I can recall it, though I wish I couldn't.

So, of course, there would be spots of dribble on the carpet after she left, which would have to be cleaned. The worst was, when she came to pay, and spoke to you, and would drool all over the counter, seemingly without realising it. One could not help oneself from heaving, on the verge of vomiting, yet trying to hide it, because, apart from her unfortunate affliction, she was a nice old lady.

I must have cleaned the pooled mess of saliva of the counter once she'd gone, but, perhaps fortunately, my mind seems to have permanently deleted the memory.

Hope this is helpful

Yours Sincerely,

Sir Humphrey

[RecoveringKinkoid]

Probably had rotten teeth. We had a resident schizophenic (who, interestingly enough, was NOT a sucky customer. He had his moments, like when he wasn't taking his meds, where he was problematic, but for the most part, he was a good guy.) who drooled sometimes when he was having a bad day. I think it was his teeth.

[BlaqueKatt]

tip for those that have trouble not gagging-smiling surpresses the gag reflex(plus the customer thinks you're happy and giving good service):wave:

BlaqueKatt-who has no gag reflex due to throat surgery:eek: (get your mind out of the gutter...theres no room for mine:D )

[PuckishOne]

I also spent a little time working with a social-services agency (read: homeless shelter) and encountered a veritable Technicolor roster of stink there, which is to be expected, I guess, given the clientele. My personal favorite was Eau de 7,500-year-old Ashtray mixed with a splash of A Giant Flatulent Yak Attacked Me With Its Poo Cannon.

As for the people who load up on the cologne, and seemingly can't tell, my own mother was guilty of this for years...nasty, cheap swill called Wind Song ($3 per gallon, I believe). It occurred to me that recently she'd switched to a lighter fragrance (meaning one that couldn't be detected by satellites from space), and I think the reason why is that she quit smoking. Now that she can smell again, she no longer needs to apply her perfume with a compressed air hose. :p

[karma_gypsy]

We'd get all kinds, they worst would be the ones smelling of alcohol, even when they're not drunk, and then the ones smelling of cigarettes and have cigarette breath.
Another is women who have to slather on the perfume, you could stand 10 feet away and still smell them, you can almost see their perfume cloud trail as they wander the store.
B.O. - don't get a whole lot of that, but yeah, some people can knock you backwards.
There's this woman who chewed the chewing tobacco stuff. Her teeth were quite gross and stumpy and black/yellow colored. She wasn't really an SC, but still, yuck! Her hands were of a yellow tinge as well. You couldn't understand what she was saying either because she was partly deaf and she had a mouth full of tobacco.

[jfreak125]

I work in technology retail, and we tend to get many, many customers who have not bathed in weeks... mostly middle easterners for some reason...

[JustAGirl]

Once you get hit by a skunk spray, the first 10 mins or so you smell it. After that, your nose shut-down. It was probably a faint smell to him by that time.

But man, how did he get in the store without someone noticing is my question? Gee, that one reason I'll do personal shopping for someone, "You get spray by a skunk. I'll get the stuff for you, stay right there, outside." Aisles should have been emptying, customers running for fresh air, dog yelping...

:lol: :lol: :lol:

sorry but THAT was funny!

next time (hopefully there won't BE a next time) tell him tomato juice (LOTS of it) is supposed to get rid of it. IIRC anyways.

he way I've found to remove the smell (or at least a vast majority of it) is to immerse the "victim" to the limit possible without drowning for at least five minutes in a warm bath with a lot of lemon juice, peroxide and baking soda mixed in.

I'll have to remember that...

I've had the BO customer, and every now and then I'll get another one who reeks of diaper doo. Most times its been my fellow co-irkers that STINK

heh

[XCashier]

tip for those that have trouble not gagging-smiling surpresses the gag reflex(plus the customer thinks you're happy and giving good service):wave:
If you get a lot of stinky customers, ask your manager if you can keep a jar of Vicks Vapo-Rub under the counter. Then if you see one of the frequent BO customers, you can discretely rub some under your nose before he/she comes to the counter.

[ShinyGreenApple]

We have one lady that comes in all the time, must be in her mid 70's, or maybe less because she smokes like a chimney. She's well known for finding people to give her cash for her food stamps, so instead of getting food, she can buy her cheap cigs and booze. She always wears dirty sweatpants and a man's pocket t-shirt, and I'm always reminded of a public restroom that hasn't been cleaned in a few weeks. Or the toilets flushed, combined with stale smoke. One of our cashiers reporter her to the police because she was living in a station wagon in the parking lot, and dozen or so cats shared the car with her. The police said that there was nothing they could do, as she was unwilling to come to the homeless shelter with them.

You betting believe I sanitize my counter and bagracks after I've waited on her, then run to the bathroom to scald my hands with hot water and enough soap to bathe an elephant. It's usually about two hours before I stop having the urge to use hand sanitizer, despite the fact I've already washed them. Blech!

And then I have the general customers with bad chewing habits and always reek of spit and tobacco. *gag* I don't have anything against tobacco users, but I know some people who are perfectly neat & clean about their habit. No need to be disgusting and come in with the stuff dribbling out your mouth like a zombie.