If you’ve ever worked in retail, you’ve had a retail nightmare. That’s the belief held by musician Jessica Delisle and comedian Alicia Tobin, two artists living in Vancouver and “co-ghosts” of one of the funniest podcasts around, Retail Nightmares. Join Delisle and Tobin each week as they invite a new guest onto the show to recall past retail-related miseries — to always-entertaining degrees. Read on to learn about how the the podcast got started, where the famous term ‘puppos’ comes from, and what makes retail woes such a relatable topic for comedy.
How would you describe Retail Nightmares to someone who has never listened to it?
JD: Just a fun, silly time where we talk about our individual horror stories, which are also very relatable. They’re a sort-of shared nightmare. If you’ve ever worked in retail or customer service, you know exactly what we’re talking about. But it’s also a lot of talking about food.
AT: In each episode we start out talking about people’s retail experiences, but we get off track a lot and end up talking about things like cute animals and kombucha.
How did the podcast come to fruition?
JD: About a year ago we were at a memorial for our friend who’d passed away, and I’d organized the memorial at the store where I worked, so there were a lot of customers and friends and old co-workers. We’d both been drinking some wine and Alicia spotted this one woman who was horrible and she’d had past experiences with her that were nightmares. Alicia asked me, “Is it just me or is that woman the worst?” and I was like, “No no, I could tell you so many stories.” and then we’re like, let’s start a podcast. And so we did.
AT: So many people’s careers will be in retail, or they spend part of their time working in customer service, face-to-face with the public. I’ve met so many interesting people working in retail and customer service, some of my closest friends, some of the most interesting and funniest people, and everyone has at least one story that makes your skin peel off of your body.
JD: It sort of reminds me of those teen magazines that asked you to send in your most embarrassing stories; I was so into reading those, where everything falls apart. Also, most of our friends who are musicians and artists and comedians and writers have to work these crummy jobs to support what they really want to do.
AT: I’m hoping that if someone hears our podcast, who hasn’t worked in retail before, they’ll have a new perspective on the challenges. Working in retail, you have to be really nice and put yourself out there everyday, and there’s a really interesting dynamic — between the public and people who are in a position to serve them — I’m usually not very fond of. People could really brush up on their kindness skills and their respect. Just take time to ask people in retail how their day is going.
JD: And acknowledge that they’re a human.
Why do you think retail in particular is prone to bringing out the worst in humanity?
JD: When people go into a store, I think most of them are focused on what they need and only that. The way our culture is sort of panders to that and makes it allowable, to talk down to people who are serving you. Also, just a lot of people are rich assholes.
AT: I’m not entirely sure because it’s not something that I practice. I try to be kind. . . I mean, I would love to be a rich asshole, but I would still be a nice rich asshole. I feel like manners are just optional for some people and they only use manners when it’s going to get them something.
How does coming from two different backgrounds — comedy for Alicia and music for Jessica — influence the podcast?
JD: It gets us a good mix of guests. The podcast has amazing music in it too, all written by Jay Arner, and we collaborate on it. Jay’s the silent member, the man behind the scenes. He wants us to start a rumour that he doesn’t exist.
AT: The thing I’ve found is that some of the funniest people I know aren’t comedians. Jessica and I take turns booking guests and she books the bulk of the musicians and I book the bulk of the comedians, but everybody makes a good guest. Some of the funniest people just don’t find their way to comedy.
What inspired the delightful recurring segment “Puppo of the Week”?
JD: My friend started using the term ‘puppo,’ and I’m not sure where he got it from, and when we went on tour together across Canada we started calling everything puppo. If something was cute, you’d just put an ‘o’ at the end of it, so if a horse is cute, it’s a horso. That was the one thing I wanted to do with the podcast, us talking about a Puppo of the Week. It’s a good balance because sometimes things get dark when we talk about the retail nightmare — the puppo brings it back up and makes it lighter and makes everyone realize the world isn’t such a terrible place to live in.
AT: Plus, Jessica and I have this in common, it’s almost like a disorder, where the whole world stops for a squirrel, a dog, a cat, a cute child, a lovely senior, a nice-looking muffin. Birds rate pretty high with me these days. It could be anything. We’re both animal people and neither of us are allowed pets where we live, so we’re desperate.
Have you had ever had former bosses or coworkers contact you after they’re mentioned on the podcast?
AT: We never really mention anyone by name.
JD: We try and keep things vague enough that no one would ever get offended. Also, I’m guessing that the people who are oblivious enough to treat us badly are also probably not going to be looking up podcasts about retail.
AT: I don’t think any of my past bosses who were very difficult to deal with or customers have any idea that I am a human. Or are necessarily interested in my career as a comedian.
JD: Those people probably aren’t Googling us.
Make yourself feel comparatively better by listening to other people’s terrible retail experiences: check out the Retail Nightmares podcast either through iTunes or their website www.retailnightmares.com.
