Shopko, Rhinelander, WI

This is part 2 of my summer job series. Click the following links for part 1, 3, 4, or 5.

My 2nd job was at a Wisconsin-based retail store called Shopko. The starting salary of $6.25 an hour was a $0.50 raise from my previous job.

I started out as a cashier since that's what I'd done at the grocery store. I was training another new employee a week after I started. Within 2-3 months my boss recognized that I was bored and moved me to stocking shelves. I spent most of my time stocking new shipments, unloading trucks, backstocking merchandise that didn't fit on the floor, and restocking the floor.

I remember them training me for a few months to take on a role of a full-time employee who would be going on vacation. Right when her vacation came up my little brother's Little League baseball team made the state tournament and my dad was pretty insistent that I go with the family. I was sure I'd lose my job for it, but as mad as my boss was, I lived to see another day at the store...

A year or so in I got a new boss, Tom. We never got along very well. I didn't like him and he didn't like me. He gave me a written warning once because he claimed that I put the price stickers in the wrong spot in the lamp aisle. He tried to deflect responsibility and say the store manager was really particular about the lamp aisle and it was him who really had the beef with me, but the store manager never said a thing about it. I argued my point with Tom since I thought he was crazy and only signed his written warning when he assured me it only meant I'd read it, not that I agreed with it.

Our security guy would occasionally ask us for backup. One time, 5 or 6 of us were called off from unloading a truck to come up to the security room and help with a bust. We watched the security cameras as a group of 3 people in their 20s with a baby in a car seat stuffed CDs into a diaper bag and the car seat. We were then stationed near the entrance of the store to help in case they tried to run for it when they left. Thankfully they didn't.

That same security guy was later fired when he used a key to get into an employee's locker, take her car keys, and prank her. I think he pulled her car up to the emergency parking area and left it there.

The music selection in Shopko was awful. To this day I refer to songs on their playlist as the "Shopko Classics." It wasn't uncommon to hear the same song twice in a shift, which got pretty old after a few years of working 5 days a week.

By the time I left I'd worked in every department except Optical. I helped out in the pharmacy a few times, lawn & garden in the spring and summer, and pulled the night shift during a couple of winter breaks in college. When I left I was making something like $7.15 an hour, not much, but enough to pay for my first year and a half of college.

I think everyone should work retail at some point in their life. It gives you a whole new appreciation for people, both customers and employees...

Cirilli's County Market, Rhinelander, WI

This week I'm going to take a look at the summer jobs I had in high school and college. Click the following links for part 2, 3, 4, or 5.

I got my first job at age 14. I had looked into getting a paper route for a while but that never went anywhere. I started looking around at places that would actually hire a 14-year-old kid and decided to go for a grocery store. I figured anyone could bag groceries.

I dropped off an application at Trig's, a local grocery store with a few locations in Northern Wisconsin. I didn't hear anything back so I turned to the only other store in town, Cirilli's County Market. The Cirilli family had owned a grocery store in Rhinelander for as long as anyone who had ever lived there could remember.

I walked into the store and asked for an application at the front desk. I left the store, spent an hour or so filling it out, and returned with my mom to hand it in. When I did, Jeff Schultz walked up to the front desk. He was the co-owner along with Tony Cirilli. My recollection is bad, but I think he was somewhere around 50, a little tall and big. Mary Raabe was working behind the counter and he asked her (and me?) who I was. She told him I was applying and handed him my application. He took a quick look at it and said, "Hire him!"

I spent the next year bagging groceries and the year after that as a cashier. Being home schooled, I often worked during school hours, which always threw people off. I wonder how many people shook their heads at the screw-up high school dropout who bagged their groceries.

I started making $4.75 an hour, which was minimum wage for the initial 90-day probationary period for a minor. When I left I was making $5.75. I remember when an older kid who'd been working there for a few years longer than me happened to see the hourly wage on my paycheck when we picked them up at the same time one day. I was making only $0.10 less than him. Let's just say I didn't know many people working there for the pay.

There are a lot of memories from that job. I remember Tuesdays, with a BOGO deal on all bakery bread and a 5% senior citizen (55+) discount that made me sweat every customer who appeared to be between the age of 50 and 60. I remember making the 3-mile bike ride in 10 minutes because I only had 10 minutes to get to work. I remember working on Christmas morning - yes, they were open Christmas Day - and thinking how horrible every person was who was shopping instead of at home. I remember Mary yelling at me for stopping for a few minutes to talk to a coworker and get a drink and then writing her an apology letter that made her feel terrible about it. I remember Tony's kid working at the store and clipping inappropriate articles from magazines and posting them in the break room. I remember Anne Marie wearing Bears shirts anytime they played the Packers. I remember taking loads of bread, cakes, cookies, donuts, etc. home from the bakery the day after it would expire.

I remember a whole lot of other things that probably don't mean much to most of you, but I learned a lot at that job.

Cirilli's County Market closed not long after I left, shutting down not long after the Walmart Supercenter opened across the street. I had a few more siblings after me who worked at either County Market or the subsequent, short-lived store they opened, Save-a-Lot. It's always sad to see a small town icon like that disappear. I'm just glad I was able to be a small part of it towards the end.