CompUSA Employees Jerking Off As They Await Store's Death
Now that they're either liquidated or being sold to TigerDirect, it's getting pretty chillax around CompUSA land. Here are some pictures reader Jon snapped when he went to snag some computer deals. In the left you can see a CompUSA employee whiling away his last remaining hours by playing a first-person-shooter. In the right, you can see the manager of the store talking to his friends and buying tickets for rap concerts. Jon says he stood in the computer section for twenty minutes before anyone helped him. Jon isn't mad, really, as he got some good deals, "but what an interesting way to close out the store," he writes on his blog. What was that, something about not with a bang, but a whimper? Full size pics inside.
CompUSA - The Final Days [So Wonderfully Idyllic]
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"Jon says he stood in the computer section for twenty minutes before anyone helped him."
Did Jon try something wild and crazy like actually going up to someone and asking for some help?
That is pretty much how they operated pre-bankruptcy also.
yeah, thats a headline that'll be picked up and distributed worldwide-- really ????? 'jerking off' ?????? Is the consumerist sinking further into the journalistic abyss? I can only imagine whats next..
Now, is the FPS, Halo or Halo 2?
Untucked shirts! Untucked shirts!
What else are they going to do? Most employees don't even know when their last day is for the stores to close so like they would care about anything...
"buying concerts for rap concerts." "Jon isn't mad, really, as he got good some good deals" ?
If you offend that easily you should fuck off and stop reading anything associated with Gawker.
The guy in the second picture, the one on the left in the leather jacket? He's totally reading Consumerist.
So? who cares. Seriously if I were an employee and knew I was getting the boot I would be doing the same thing. Besides if you need help just ask. I doubt they would say wait till I get to this lvl and Ill help you.
Just cause he's black, it's gotta be a rap concert?! I kid! I kid!
It is amazing these employees aren't worried about impressing there bosses.
@dandd: Nah, Pre-bankruptcy they were all in the back jerking off. Now that they have carte blanche to ignore customers, they've moved to the public part of the store.
What are they going to do, fire them? They're all about to be out of a job, so I can understand. I don't condone, but I understand.
I do not see what the big deal is here. One if you need help just ask. Two they are all about to be fired so I do not think they really care about customer service.
That's horrible service! They ought to lose their jobs for something like that...
Carlos Slim didn't give a flying burrito if his employees were dressed in rags. All he wanted was the high dollar merchandise transported down to Mexico City to give to his best friends and to stock his swanky homes and offices. He left the junk here for us to deal with.
Not surprising. I stopped by the one by me this weekend. One of the desktops had a sign that said "bad power switch" and was still marked $679. They also had some sort of high-end, $1100 gaming rig. It was coming up to a "no hard drive detected, unable to boot" message.
If only I'd thought to take pics.
And I didn't find any good deals - most of the stuff was only 30% off compusa's normally high prices, so you could get it cheaper at Newegg... and have a return policy.
LOL! I work at this store! These are two of the laziest guys there. I prefer to "jerk off" by reading Consumerist.
I went to a CompUSA to get BAWLS at 30% off, along with a PC game that I'd been meaning to try. Getting an item from the glass cases took an eternity. It looked like the entire store was being staffed by 3 people. A red shirt, black shirt, and a manager. The MGR was getting pulled every which way by people demanding more than the listed mark down for whatever reason. The red shirt was some kid who was desperately trying to do his job, but couldn't because everyone wanted to talk to the manager. The black shirt seemed to have accepted fate, and was half-slacking, half working at his own pace.
It took half an hour to get in and out, most of it was waiting by the game cages.
I went into the CompUSA in Alabama the other day and pretty much the same experience. I didn't need 'help' and if you need help when you're picking through what's left of the stores you shouldn't be in there.
The good news is that I got 2GB of notebook memory for $54. The bad news is that I resisted buying a dirt cheap digital camera that I reallllllly wanted.
This guy got better service than I used to at our local CompUSA. Good riddance, I say.
"Jon says he stood in the computer section for twenty minutes before anyone helped him."
How is that any different than before they were bought out?
Usually when a company has a liquidation or going out of business, the reins are handed over to another company to make sure there is no "special deals" made with relatives, friends, etc. Everyone is terminated and a new batch of people are brought in to sell the items as priced, no negotiating or markdowns. These people usually have no special training or product knowledge and are just there to sell the items.
I was in a nearby compUSA and it was the same way. The employees were shouting, cursing and throwing things around, or just milling about socializing with one another. There were good deals but I couldn't bring myself to buy anything.
What a totally misleading headline. I was expecting something a little more exciting than some old dude playing Halo.
Guys, your title SUCKS!!! That's high school journalism, unworthy of Consumerist. If I could flag it, I would.
@chouchou:
overdramatic much? "Jerking off" was used in a euphemtistic, goofing off type of way. If it had said "screwing around" would you expect to see employees fornicating?
BTW, went to closing Comp looking for cheap notenook HDD, had to assist cashier kid in using a calculator to get total with markdown. sigh...
In all seriousness, I'd be doing the same thing. They are gonna lose their jobs anyway, why work?
Oh, and I too am glad that "jerking off" was in a figurative sense. Thought they might have been wanking at their customers, that'd be horrible!
So... where was the jacking off at???
im not surprised. even in full midday business hours the sales guys at my store would hound me for the password to the tech-shop's wireless (i worked in the tech shop) so they could go on myspace on the imacs. we had one cool manager that would screw around with us too but all the other managers were uptight dicks
Anyone surprised by this needs to turn in their Consumerist card and back away from the blog slowly.
@notadoctor: I recently left one of the laptops at our CompUSA on a Consumerist article about the closing of the chain. The folks around me thought that was hilarious! But I did get a sweet deal on a Samsung HDTV last week.
It seems to me that this behaviour is not so different from when CompUSA wasn't in its death spiral.
CompUSA employees have never seemed to be that focused on business-like behavior or customer service, at least in the stores in NJ and NY that I've shopped in.
They did, however, seem quite focused on bullshitting around with each other.
Did none of you work for any start-ups during the dot com crash? This was how we all spent our time in those last weeks. Oh, and before the crash, too...
@madog: "I was expecting something a little more exciting than some old dude playing Halo."
Well, there's always lemonparty if you're looking for excitement...
Look these poor guys don't know when the stores are closing, when/if Tiger Direct is reopening or what the new owners will do. Very few people are actually buying things in this store, mostly because things are still overpriced. The one I was at was selling an apple desktop for more than a grand that had a bad motherboard. The guys are doing the best they can but honestly why run around chasing customers when they aren't likely to buy anything anyway. The only people who visit dying stores are hardcore bargain shoppers. No bargain, they are out.
HAHA Old guy playing Halo...nice.