50 ‘People Of Walmart’ Stories That Will Destroy Your Faith In Humanity

Women with a live goose in her shopping cart. She said it was a service goose.

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These Ask Reddit stories about Walmart will make you want to find a new place to shop.

1. Had to convert surveillance video footage to dvd for an attorney a while back. Was footage of a lady, clear as day, cracking open a bottle of olive oil, pouring some out on the floor, then putting on a nearby shelf. She then looks around and walks over to the spill and slips and falls. So funny to watch. It was one of those projects where I was calling people over to my desk, “you gotta see this”!

2. I worked at Walmart in the garden department, briefly in the early 90s. I am going to take a break and walk past the deodorant aisle and I see this huge guy, maybe 350 pounds, in a wife beater, put on some deodorant, put the cap back on and put it back on the shelf. Told my manager about it and he said it happens all the time.

3. When I worked there, there was a dancer or waitress (likely the former) who always came in with tons of $1 bills. She was problematic, so I tried to avoid being her cashier. One night I was the only one working, and she starts her order. It’s pretty late, and she has her daughter who is playing with markers that the woman gave her to occupy her. She doesn’t want to buy them. Couldn’t if she wanted. They’re scattered throughout the store.

I scan tons of things, and we get to the end, and she doesn’t have enough money. Cue voiding items. Checking price. Putting them back on. I recall that she took off the diapers but kept some superfluous stuff. We get to the end of her order, and she finally pays. I’ve got more than half her crap plus the mostly-empty box of markers on the belt. I print her receipt twice so I can take a look.

She bought 12 items. It took a fucking hour. There were something like 40 voided items. Ridiculous.

4. My time to fucking shine; I knew those four years at Walmart would pay off eventually.

I worked the service desk, so I dealt with/saw some of the most epic people of Walmart bullshit imaginable.

1.). I had a couple attempt to return a half empty and exceptionally sticky bottle of KY because “It didn’t work, it still hurt when he put it in my butt.” I stood there for a solid thirty seconds holding a half used bottle of lube that was bought and used to shove something up this woman’s ass before I regretfully informed them that I couldn’t possibly process this return. I handed them their lube back and then went to the bathroom to dry heave and wash my hands.

2.) I had a middle aged guy come in an ask for a paper job application because for whatever reason he didn’t feel comfortable using the online kiosk. Ok, whatever, it’s a slow night and I don’t have shit to do. I scrounged up a paper application and he started to fill it out at the desk. We shot the shit while he was filling it out; he was funny and we had the same taste in books. Once he got to the question “Have you ever been convicted of a felony?” He paused and asked me if he should answer that honestly. I told him yes, because if HR ran his name and found something then he would be ineligible for hire since he lied. He then proceed to tell me he had been convicted of a felony. I shrugged, what the fuck ever dude. Welcome to the Walmart freak family, homie. “And it was a sex crime”, he says. “Well, crimes.” At this point I take a step back. “Oh, don’t worry, I only raped guys so your fine,” he said and calmly went back to filling out his application as my eyebrows met my hairline.

3.) We had a customer, we called her Huffy because she would come in and huff the aerosol dust remover that people use to clean their keyboards, get high, and then pass out in the bathroom for a few hours. I should also tell you that at the end of our parking lot was a small grassy median, and on the other side of the median is a Burger King. Remember this note.

Well management and loss prevention got tired of ol’ Huffy coming in and stealing dust remover and taking up valuable bathroom space. So the next time she came in a manager and a loss prevention associate were in her like flies on shit. Somehow, that wily ol’ Huffy was able to partake in a few cans of dust remover before the two associates moved in. Once Huffy saw two employees walking towards her she took off, with Walmart’s best giving chase. I’m not sure why they chased her honestly. It was probably a slow day for them. The electronics worker who saw this all go down got on his walkie and radioed us up at the front, “Shit’s going down and it’s moving towards you.”

I didn’t have anybody at the desk so I moved out on the floor just in time to see Huffy and the two associates streak through the doors like bats out of hell. I ran to the door because I am not one to miss a shit show. I saw Huffy get in her car and make a break out of the parking lot, clipping two cars as she made her escape, leaving to winded Walmart workers watching he drive off into the sunset.

Now believe it or not, but someone who has just huffed two cans of dust remover isn’t the best driver. I watched the car start to swerve halfway down the parking lot, then straighten out as Huffy gunned it. She jumped the median and slammed her car through the back wall of the Burger King, coming to the stop in the vicinity of the kitchen. Hands down one of the better attempts to escape the long arm of the Walmart law I’ve seen.

5. I worked at Walmart a few years ago. I don’t really have many personal experiences with people like that, but one of my Coworkers told me something that happened to him once:

Apparently, some asshole customer took one of the mouse traps and hid it at the back of one of the shelves. Poor coworker reached in and got his hand caught in it. Idk if that’s a “people of Walmart” thing or a “people are scumbags” thing, but it certainly didn’t sound pleasant.

6. I worked at a Phoenix area Walmart in the late 2000s. We used to have a customer come in dressed head to toe in a baby outfit complete with a bonnet, a pacifier and adult diapers. It was a middle aged white guy. The first time i ever saw him i freaked out but everyone else what like “oh thats baby guy”. Apparently he was a normal guy with a wife and a baby and one day he just snapped and decided to live the rest of his life as a baby. He would pay people to come to his house and change him and feed him in a high chair etc. he was a minor celebrity in the area before he passed away.

7. If this says anything about the associates, just last week I was in the employee bathroom when another associate walked in. All the stalls were full so he pissed in the sink, didn’t wash hands, and left.

8. Finally something I can answer! Worked at Walmart for five years and saw

Women with a live goose in her shopping cart. She said it was a service goose and the store can’t ask to see papers so.

Guy with a live goat in his cart. Again said it was a service animal.

Guy uh whacking one out in the bathroom.

Another guy walking around the store in just an overcoat with no pants or shorts on and pretty sure no underwear. It was just enough to cover the naughty parts. He was walking around with his hands in the coats pockets and I’m pretty sure he was working up the courage to flash someone.

Was stocking candy and a kid with his parents came down the aisle. They kept looking and stuff and the boy said he needed the bathroom. Mom told him to hold it. Well they kept looking at candy for seven or eight minutes with the boy getting louder and louder about the need to pee. He finally went all over the floor.

Was in the parking lot and saw a car pull put of a parking space and drive right into one of the light polls. No idea how anyone could miss it as they are painted yellow for a reason.

9. I don’t work at Walmart, but I was once in line behind a woman who was trying to buy a half dozen eggs, though it kept ringing up as a full dozen. The cashier spent several minutes messing around with her computer to try and identify the problem, and finally called over the manager for help. The first thing the manager said was “We don’t sell half dozens….did you cut a dozen eggs carton in half?” The lady responded “yeah, I only needed 6.” The managers face made me really glad I don’t work in retail.

10. My mom worked at Walmart for about a year. She actually liked it as she was more active, but she decided to quit after the jewelry department manager had a meltdown and started throwing jewelry at customers. One old lady got pelted in the head with a heavy ring box and it was over.

Turns out the manager was selling the jewelry to friends and family, but would keep the boxes and stuff them with rocks and trash so inventory would stay the same. She had the meltdown before she was caught.

11. At my local Wisconsin Walmart, a female employee was promoted to cashier in the liquor department. This made another female employee jealous because she wanted that job. So she went in there one afternoon and shot her.

12. I used to work at Walmart corporate HQ and sat with a group of loss prevention associates at our shareholders meeting one year.

I asked what was the most ridiculous thing any of them had seen returned.

The winning answer IMHO was an opened box of condoms because they were TOO BIG!

I personally witnessed a woman returning a half-eaten birthday cake because it “gave her grandma the diabetes” and she had to go to the ER.

13. I don’t work there, but a few years ago, a young woman walked into my local Walmart, went straight to the bathroom, then 5 minutes later walked out of the store. Turns out she had given birth in one of the toilets! She left the baby there in the toilet! It was still alive!

14. I worked maintenance there. One day I was out retrieving carts, when loss prevention called out for help. She caught our pharmacist stealing a bottle of dish detergent. He struggled. Hard. Way harder than the situation called for. During the struggle, pharmacists jacket came off and numerous pill bottles scattered across the parking lot. He had a good scam ruined by a $2 bottle of dish soap!

15. I literally saw a woman change her baby’s diaper in an aisle then drop the diaper full of poop on the floor and continue walking.

16. This was back in the late ’90s. I was working at Wal-Mart as my first job as a teenager. I was floated to the garden department one day and there was a guy looking at lawn fertilizer. I walked over and asked if he needs help, he said “Not now, just looking at the different kinds you have.” Pretty standard reply from the guy, so I said “Okay, let me know.” I walk away, and then swing back about 5 minutes later. Same guy has proceeded to rip open about 10 different kinds of the fertilizer all over the ground and is rolling around in the stuff. He is also taste sampling the stuff. I called my manger because I did not want to deal with it. Security escorted the guy out the store and called an ambulance in case the ingestion of the fertilizer hurt him.

17. Work in a Walmart deli. I was browsing around the store on my lunch. I saw a crowd gathered around a section in the home section.

There was a guy furiously beating himself off in front of a mirror. He came on the mirror, and left. No management stopped him, the ended up claiming out there mirror and trashing it.

18. Years ago when I worked there I had a meth couple who kept buying things in an attempt to get a perfectly even total. I consider them proof that there really is someone for everyone.

19. Both of my parents work at the Walmart home offices in Bentonville (not the actual stores). One day my stepdad told me he took a call for a guy trying to sue Walmart because a woodchip penetrated through the shoes he made out of tape he bought from Walmart.

20. So I’m not a Walmart employee. I work at a printing company. We recently printed postcards for a “Swings-giving” an apparently no inhibitions party right? The please RSVP emails were their Walmart work emails. That’s pretty much the most Walmart thing I’ve ever seen.

21. Fucking kids elbow deep in the bulk candy and parents doing nothing.

22. I worked setting up and opening a Wal-Mart back in the 90’s. Grand opening, lines to the back of the store, madness. Woman in line chugs a bottle of Tide liquid laundry detergent. So add to the chaos EMT’s, ambulance, and the accompanying craziness.

So it turns out she didn’t speak English and thought it was fruit punch, probabl because of the red bottle.

23. Had a random dude try to steal my cart on my way out to my car. Grabbed the cart and told me it was his.

I told him we could go back inside and sort it out with the loss prevention guys there. He just kept repeating it was his.

I had enough and just pulled it with me back towards the building, he tried to stop me by grabbing onto the other side of the cart, ended up getting dragged along with the cart, then after getting dragged a few feet, screamed “FUCK YOU!!!” and ran off.

I went back in and told the guys there was some crazy asshole trying to steal people’s groceries in the parking lot.

I can’t figure out for the life of me why he didn’t just grab the ice cream and the batteries I had in the cart and run off w those instead of trying to take the whole cart.

24. Never worked there but at a Walmart near me a few years ago it was discovered that there was a small active meth lab in one of the bathrooms.

25. I once waited behind a older black lady who had armpit hair that was incredibly long.

That’s okay, that’s not a big deal.

But she braided it. There were little 4 inch long fros sticking out from under her armpits and I couldn’t help but notice although I didn’t say anything.

26. I saw a guy at a Holiday steal a hotdog. One of the ones on the rolly thingees. He didn’t grab a bun or anything. Just stuffed a loose leaf hot dog in his pants and walked out.

27. At the Walmart next to my work, this guy ripped open a bag of raw fish and began eating it. When he was confronted by the employees, he ran outside into the parking lot where he was promptly hit by a car. Pretty sure drugs were involved in this situation.

28. Oh God…here we go.

During a dark time in my life many years ago, I stocked a Wal-Mart working overnights. Now, daytime Wal-Mart is weird enough, but nighttime Wal-Mart might as well be the fucking Twilight zone.

Theres a lot of stories, but one that stands out is one night around 3am, I’m helping stock the health and beauty aisles. If you ever shop a Wal-Mart you also know this is where the lube, condoms, pregnancy tests, etc are kept.

I’m rounding the corner to move into this aisle when I hear hushed but slightly panicked voices. Now, the sex stuff is a high-theft area, so I listen thinking someone is trying to jack some pregnancy tests. What I heard went beyond normal Wal-Mart fuckery.

The last thing I heard before coming into view was “you better not be, mom and dad will kill the both of us”. I come around to see a male and female teenager stop dead and look at me white as ghosts. They have similar hair color and skin complexions…and well, given what was said between them it’s fair to assume they were brother and sister, and in the sister’s hands were several boxes of pregnancy tests. They just walk away silently after seeing me.

Yep, total Roll Tide moment at Wal-Mart.

29. Three weeks into my sentence at Walmart, a grown adult pooped in one of the food aisles. Welcome to the big leagues, kid.

30. Former Wal Mart cashier/Customer Service Desk associate here. Had a guy bring in a copied $10 bill to make a purchase. When the cashier told him he couldn’t use it, he demanded to speak with a manager.

Now, I’m not sure if a hand-colored xeroxed $10 bill, or the manager approving the sale was the most Wal Mart thing, but I think the argument could be made that it doesn’t matter in the end.

31. There is a guy at my Walmart who pushes his cart while he’s on a hover board. Living in 3018.

32. Once had a redneck with a mullet try and steal a comforter by just walking out with it, not even from the check out lanes. Just blatantly walking out. When I asked can I see his receipt he hands me a receipt from 7/11 for beer. I said this is a 7/11 receipt and he looks at me and with the biggest smile goes “AYYYYEEEEEE” hands me the comforter and walks out like nothing happened. I was like wtf.

33. Once there was a woman who had her pants pulled up just a little over her waist, but her long, flat boobs were tucked in them so her pants were also like a tube top. She didn’t have a shirt on or bra, it was just pants. It was very disturbing

34. An actual shit on the floor. Not in the bathroom next to the toilet, in the section for office supplies.

35. Have worked at my local store on and off since 2004. The family that stands out the most is the one who homeschooled all their kids and claimed to have an “animal rescue”. They’d come once or twice a week and collect all the fruit and veg that would have otherwise gone to a food bank or the compactor, I’m not sure. Claimed it was for the animals but the produce associates said they’d eat it right off the truck. They would often bring rescue skunks shopping in the store with them, riding in the basked of the motorized cart that the patriarch of the family rode in, saying it was a service skunk that alerted him when his blood sugar levels were too high. Kids were almost illiterate and always unwashed and poorly dressed, frequently got scabies and lice medication from the pharmacy.

36. A couple of employee stories by a customer, if that counts.

First one: Checking out in a Walmart when the cashier started getting chatty, telling me she mostly worked at WM for the insurance, but her main source of income was as a phone sex operator. She told me how much money she made and straight-up told me she bet I’d be great at it, too. I’m practically phobic of awkward conversations, so I just mumbled something about not having a good “voice” for that, at which point she said, “Oh, you never use your real voice; you make up characters!” Then she proceeded to give me a demo of all of her “characters.” I didn’t go back to that WalMart for years.

Second one is all on me. In a different local WM there was one greeter who was super nice and friendly, and I always stopped to chat with him a few minutes but always just about boring stuff like the weather, nothing personal. For a couple of years. In my defense I had only ever seen two types of people working as WM greeters: the elderly and the disabled (physical or mental); this guy was not old and had no apparent physical disabilities, so I just kind of assumed he had a mental impairment of some sort (the fact he was cheerful about being a WM greeter added to this assumption). Nope. Turns out he also only worked at WM for insurance for himself and his kids, but his “real” job was owning a long-standing karate school and he, himself, was a multi-level black belt (don’t remember what level). He never knew I’d originally assumed he was mentally disabled, and I learned a very valuable (and lasting) lesson about assumptions and judging people by job or appearance.

37. I don’t know if you want looks or behavior, so I’ll try and cover both. I worked overnights. My store was right across the street from a hospital, but only a couple blocks away from a strip club, so you can only guess the variety of people I saw.

I worked on the grocery side of the store, not general merchandise, so I didn’t see a lot of crazy stuff. I mostly had to deal with rude idiots. For instance…

  • Customers would refuse to move while I was pulling pallets and insist that I go around them in addition to all the holiday displays and construction. Yeah, that’s not happening.

  • Customers getting angry at me that food items didn’t come in a smaller size, as if I personally did this to fuck them over.

  • Getting hit on by randos at 1:30 in the morning. Specifically, I had a guy ask me where the bathrooms were as an excuse to talk/flirt with me. He also thought telling me he’d just gotten out of prison would really make my panties drop or something.

  • People would open up the cooler doors to the dairy and stick their heads in to ask where products were instead of finding an employee on the floor. Mind, there’s a bunch of giant-ass cooling fans in the dairy cooler that make it impossible to hear anything. I’d have random-ass customers screaming “WHERE’S THE FETA?!” out of fucking nowhere. Scared the shit out of me.

  • Big groups of teenagers that would come in after midnight and ride the scooters around the store and trash the place and generally make a nuisance of themselves. Most of them had to be escorted out by management.

  • Saw a failed shoplifting attempt while on break once. Guy tried to walk out with a couple of flatscreen TVs in his cart, then bolted when the door thing started beeping. The store didn’t do much about it.

  • Had a customer threaten to call the store manager and have him fire me (apparently they were best friends or some shit) because I wouldn’t get him cigarettes. I was up front watching the self-checkouts and the door and was told not to leave that area for any reason because we were pathetically understaffed. The cigarette counter was closed anyway and no amount of explaining would make him stop. It actually egged him on. I was putting my job at risk either way, so I got his damn cigarettes.

  • Had a woman threaten to call the store manager because the eyeshadow she found on a clearance rack had been marked down to $2 and she wanted it for $1. She started screaming and making threats and sat outside on the benches for three hours on the phone bitching about the store and how awful we were.

  • And finally, some former friends of mine tried to start shit with me while I was on the clock. They followed me to my department and were opening up all the outside dairy cooler doors to try and scream at me, so I hid in the meat freezer until another employee came through and I told him to get out manager.

38. A woman called her 2 year old son “muthaf#%ker” so many times I started to believe it was on his birth certificate.

SIT Down, muthaf#%ker!!!

Shut up muthaf#%ker!!

39. A family of very overweight people in their pajamas at 4pm all on motorized carts.

40. I saw a cashier co-worker get arrested at her cash register for theft. She had been “air-scanning items” and giving them away to her friends and family

When I worked as a cashier someone gave me fake $100 so badly made the ink smeared when I scratched the corner. I had to walk away from my register and notify the floor manager. To my surprise the people didn’t seem to understand what was happening and waited there until the cops showed up and arrested them. They literally did not move from the line. At one point asked me what the hold-up was and I even told them it was because their money was fake (not a good idea but these people were really dumb).

I saw a man run from our loss prevention officer and get caught and a woman came out of nowhere and attacked the loss prevention officer while screaming “I’m pregnant!”. The cops came. She actually was not pregnant but the wife of the man caught stealing. They were both arrested.

41. I worked at one of the older Walmart stores (not Supercenter) back in 1998. I don’t recall much of the customers, except Ms. Allen.

Ms. Allen was this elderly woman, whom everybody knew, who had a bad stutter. She apparently lived alone and had really poor hygiene skills. Her hair was always frizzy, and she often smelled of terrible B.O. She would always put $100 or so worth of “granny panties” on Lay-Away, pay her minimum deposit (10% at the time, I think), then come back a month later (60-day Lay-Away, but it was recommended you make a payment in 30 days – didn’t have to, but it was recommended) and cancel the Lay-Away. Not pay it off; cancel. As in “get her money back”. You were allowed up to three (3) Lay-Away accounts at a time, which she did.

She had been caught shoplifting a time or two at both the Walmart and at the Kmart in the same town. She always carried this giant purse in the baby seat of the cart, big enough to probably smuggle out a TV. She was caught a few times trying to make off with the granny panties. When Loss Prevention and the local Police Dept. tried to question her, she’d try speaking with the really bad stutter, and they had to just let her go.

42. Not that this is really “peopleofwalmart” specific, but hey, I’ve been catcalled in the daytime, while working. I worked in the produce section so I had on those green aprons and my hair up in a ponytail. Know what’s great? The look on a guy’s face when he realizes he just whistled at my ass while I was stocking shelves, except I’m a dude. I’ve been miss’d, mam’d, darlin’d, hey hot stuff’d…

43. I was there getting an eye exam in the vision center, and when I walked by one of the rooms, there was an old man eating a piece of fried chicken while he got his eye exam.

44. I worked at Walmart a long time ago.

I once saw an older man in his mid 40s, 250 lbs, walking around in construction boots, Daisy dukes, and a pink belly shirt. At least he was confident!

I also had someone shit in the middle of the shoe aisle, then left a trail of shit from there to the front doors and then threw their dirty underwear in a bush. So happy I didn’t have to clean that up.

45. I once worked in the fabric/sewing department and was asked to cover Hardware while the guy was on break. I wasn’t trained on how to mix paint, so worst case scenario I bother the guy if need be. Easy enough right?

Not even 10 minutes later an older (65+) customer comes up asking about a vacuum in the aisle. I go to see if I can assist him with questions.

He asks if he can open it and try it out in store, I say no. He opens it and starts assembling it right in front of me.

Of course this is the moment my coworker comes back to find me staring dumbfoundedly at this old man.

46. Some dick head set a dump bin full of emoji pillows on fire. Store filled up with noxious yellow smoke. Fun times.

47. I lived close enough to work to go home for lunch. On the way back, I turn off the highway onto the feeder street in front of Walmart. An SUV comes barreling out of nowhere, blows through a stop sign, cuts me off, and speeds into Walmart parking lot. He pulls up to the front and parks. Not in a parking space; literally in front next to the entrance doors. I park and start walking in to clock in, anxious to see the douche behind the wheel. Out steps a dude with no shirt, wearing shorts and high heels. Goes straight to the tobacco checkout, gets cigarettes and leaves.

48. I worked in a neighborhood market in Tennessee. One day a heavy storm rolled in as I was pushing carts. As I was pushing in my last row, I saw a man walking towards the entrance, and since it was raining it looks like he was wearing a white suit with yellow polka dots.

I go inside, turns out it’s a very thin spongebob onesie. He wasnt wearing underwear. It was not a good day for my eyes.

49. When I used to work there I was standing at the front once and an old man came up to me with his shit covered underwear in his hand saying he had an accident. Then I followed a shit trail all the way to the washroom where it looked like a shit bomb went off.

50. Not much of a story, But I work in the deli, and routinely an absolute giant of a man (width and height), comes in and buys all of my hot wings. I don’t exaggerate when I say this guys an easy 7 feet, because I’m 6’ 2″ and this gentleman absolutely towers over me. I fear the day when we run out of the spicy goodness and he vaporises me with his immense strength. Thought Catalog Logo Mark


About the author

January Nelson

January Nelson

January Nelson is a writer, editor, and dreamer. She writes about astrology, games, love, relationships, and entertainment. January graduated with an English and Literature degree from Columbia University.