Organic dust atop some premium wines

The personnel nightmares continue unabated at Palmyra, which demand far greater attention than anywhere else. As much as can ever be the case in this high overturn industry, the other two locations remain stable — and in fact, it’s not uncommon for Liberty to go months without a single change. Some of Palmyra’s vagaries are explained away as the result of hiring college kids, in a college town, though this only accounts for so much.

One mild mannered kid, hired to work in grocery, everyone seems to agree has great potential. He’s quiet, he’s smart, and he works hard. Until the afternoon where, with a long cart full of product from a recent delivery in the aisle with him, which he is busy stocking, and Trudy conversing with another employee a little further down that same stretch, this kid inexplicably, forcibly yanks his apron off, without any apparent provocation.

“I can’t TAKE this shit anymore!” he shouts, slams said apron to the ground and walks off the job.

Another employee in the meat/deli department is suspended for allegedly trying to bite someone else’s finger, when the other party pointed it at his chest, denies having done so, then quits instead of serving the suspension. Possibly inspired by Edgar bringing his mom aboard, or possibly just desperate, Christie hires her former mother-in-law to fill the void back there.

Then there’s the afternoon Corey decides he’s going to get a handle on what’s happening around this place, by strolling in on his day off, unannounced. His regular schedule, for months upon months now, has been to take every Sunday and Monday off — which is great and all, except the employees know this, and can plan accordingly. Like on this occasion, where he finds the entire deli department sitting down and shooting the breeze in the employee break room.

Sundays are slow, sure, with shorter hours, too, but even so this is a bit extreme. Corey materializes in the doorway, pointing his finger back at the deli and telling them that breaktime’s over. Dave and Steve return to duty without protest, yet the youngest and least tenured of this trio, Ashley, somehow believes she has just grounds for airing out her beefs. Which leads to an argument between Corey and Ashley, spilling out into the store.

“MOTHERFUCKING COCKSUCKAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!” Ashley screams, as nearby shoppers exchanged horrified glances, and she begins walking toward the exit.

Corey chuckles and tells her, “I would’ve thought you’d be more original than that.”

These episodes appear to trigger some sort of nuclear reaction, in that with each person flipping out and quitting, complaining about what an insane place this is to work, their ranks are further reduced, which leads to an even more unstable environment. The funny thing is, Edgar continually thinks, his job immediately prior to this one, up north, was at an extremely similar store to this — similar size, similar demographic, also located in a dilapidated strip mall on a street that really wasn’t all that busy, either. But that place did about three times as much business, and yet nobody seemed to really have any trouble keeping up, they didn’t have nearly the staffing issues that Palmrya does, despite an even greater percentage of college students on the payroll up there.

Making broad generalities is bound to piss some people off, and there are obviously many exceptions, but roughly speaking, there’s no denying things down here in the south are expected to move in much more leisurely fashion. Many of the culture clashes are surely attributable to transplanted northerners attempting to impose a little more structure, a slightly more inspired pace. But then also often butting heads with one another on top of it and, especially here, a healthy dash of college age flightiness sprinkled into the mix.

Or maybe that’s not even it. A lot of this friction sure seems to stem from people bristling at what would be considered totally normal business practices pretty much anywhere else. You’re going against the grain of some decades’ old hippie framework, and some of this will take eons to sand away. But even that only explains so much. Because there’s no denying this establishment has displayed a certain talent for hiring the most off the wall help imaginable.

Jimmy Ray Calhoun, for example, the recently hired meat cutter, fresh out of the military and likely feeling bulletproof due to dating Duane Hatley’s daughter, has already rubbed just about everyone in the building the wrong way, albeit in much more peculiar and diabolical fashion than previous entries under this topic. For example it becomes apparent right out of the gate that he isn’t used to taking orders from women, and has no intentions of doing so.

Edgar’s mom gets an early lesson in this when, as Jimmy Ray is closing both departments alone and they basically can’t make enough chicken salad here to satiate the masses, so popular is this recipe, that she asks him to whip up a batch at some point in the evening. Which he does, although when she and the others arrive the following morning, the results are so disturbing she almost regrets asking.

Creating the batch in one of the gigantic stainless mixing bowls they always use, Jimmy Ray has placed it ever so on a cart, just inside the primary deli cooler, so that it’s propped up at eye level and staring a person down immediately upon opening the door. Staring is the operative word here for as, with clearly way too much time on his hands the previous evening, their butcher shaped the chicken salad into a highly detailed and accurately sculpted replication of a human skull, down to even an eyeball hanging down by tendons from one of the emptied out sockets.

“Oh my God!” Edgar’s mom shrieks.

“That’s fucked up,” Dave says in more measured tones.

It’s the kind of sight that instantly has them grabbing whomever they can find, which soon involves at some point every person in the store this morning, swinging by to take a look. Trudy begins snapping pictures, and others follow suit. This unholy creation which might otherwise be objectively impressive, on an artistic level…if it weren’t so obvious that what they are dealing with here is a complete psychopath.

Edgar is also able to take advantage of Corey’s predictable schedule, albeit not quite in the same manner as the recently busted loafers. Rather, frustrated already with his Corey related dealings on the beer-wine front, this has given him a great opportunity to secretly shift into Plan C.

After months of trying things Corey’s way, it’s pretty obvious to Edgar that this simply isn’t going to work. Palmyra’s illustrious store manager had pleaded his case to Duane, to have Edgar email him all cost changes and for him to enjoy the final say in all alcohol pricing, which sounded maybe passable in theory, except he only responds to half of Edgar’s emails on this topic, at best. And the other issue is, this doesn’t just involve Palmyra because, owing to the limitations of their Orchestra software, unless slapping stickers over the barcodes, the other two stores are roped into whatever Corey does or doesn’t say.

And maybe his email dodging is intentional, who knows. It would be brilliant if so, in a sense, because with this arrangement Corey can totally avoid doing anything whatsoever, and meanwhile everyone points fingers at Edgar if the alcohol margin comes back shoddy.

But then at some point, the light bulb goes off: Corey has made it very clear he wanted all “random” tag printing and price updates to be done only on Mondays, so people could get used to that schedule. Which was a pretty good idea, sure. And it was driving Edgar bonkers that anytime Corey would spot him hanging beer and wine tags, Palmyra’s resident alcohol czar would hold out his hand and say, “let me see,” and then pick out half of these, hand them back to Edgar with grand poobah type pronouncements about what these “should be” instead. Also known as oracle in the sky pricing, because Corey frequently explains that such and such gas station a mile up the road is charging this retail, and it’s implied that Edgar should somehow know that. Forcing Edgar to change these back to what they had been before, or even a different figure entirely. Which meant doing so for the other two stores as well, which meant this entire exercise was a gigantic waste of time.

So ever since Corey pleaded for this change, Edgar has been printing off the tags up there in Palmyra, for Corey to hang first thing Tuesday morning, unless somebody else, hopefully Shelly, gets to them on Monday afternoon. Except…what if he didn’t do that? What if he slowly phased out emailing beer and wine cost changes to Corey, while reverting to updating the prices himself without interference? Then stopped by Palmyra on his way home, every Monday afternoon, to hang the tags personally? Because he doesn’t think Corey would even notice, that months have gone by without a single email on this subject.

He’s only been doing so for a couple weeks, but it’s already apparent that this is a winning strategy. This department’s challenges are legion, however, so to resolve but one leaves him feeling as though he’s jogging in place. No sooner is this masterful clandestine tactic enacted, before it’s announced that they’re hiring Corey’s best buddy, some Jake Gifford character, to oversee the beer aspect at all three locations. Meanwhile, in addition to his duties as assistant store manager and town gossip, Pierre O’Brien, the Michigan Frenchman, remains thoroughly obsessed with Southside’s wine set.

“Dude, what’s the deal with all this wine?” Dale questions one day, popping into Edgar’s office, “I feel like every time I come in here, your desk is piled up with a bunch of new wine. Does it really sell all that well?”

Edgar smirks and says, “you should ask around. See what the word is on the streets about that.”

“I think I already know,” Dale says.

The truth is, Edgar thinks the alcohol fanatics around here are fairly delusional. This would apply to Pierre on the wine front, Corey, Destiny and this already troublesome Jake character on the beer. Let it be said that Edgar himself is a major craft brew aficionado — his friends and family have been known to call him a beer snob — but that has nothing to do with the topic at hand. Simply put, the sales don’t justify the massive square footage dedicated to this junk, at Palmyra and Southside.

Of course, any time you mention this, they rationalize that “it gets people in the door,” and Edgar is basically given, despite Duane’s you should be involved in all management decisions decree, looks suggesting this isn’t any of his business and he should stay out of it. And so he does, because he really doesn’t care all that much. But he feels like responding that, yes, we are seeing exactly what people it’s bringing into the store — those are the ones buying it. Which aren’t a ton. To suggest otherwise is absurd, that people are strolling in here, and their eyes are popping out of their heads as they shout, oh my God look at this beer selection! This is the coolest thing I’ve ever seen! Well, I don’t actually want to buy any…however, it did just inspire me to drop a hundred bucks on vitamins.

The beer set as Southside is as large as their dairy, while at Palmyra, it’s double that size. They already reduced Corey’s massive wine selection once, which he wasn’t too happy about, and it still takes up one entire side of a grocery aisle, surely amounting to more than the nearest Food Lion or Harris Teeter offers. Which the fanatics immediately seize upon, of course, declaring, yes! Exactly! That’s the whole point! When in fact the whole point is to, you know, sell the stuff. Who cares about a cool looking section that eats up a ton of space for minimal sales?

He feels like certain people have been reading Beer Hipster Monthly a little too long, and that part of their identity is attached to being, in their minds, some sort of sought after authority. Either that or they have allowed a few hippie friends to persuade them into carrying every obscure vintage known to man. But there are a couple other complications on top of this, too.

One would be this insanity with a particular Russian wine vendor. While their back docks are stacked to the ceiling with beer and wine anyway — another point on Edgar’s side of the ledger, in this debate — this Russian dude’s garbage offerings command a huge chunk of it. Even at Liberty Avenue, when it comes to this guy’s stuff, which has led to all sorts of speculation about what’s really going on here.

The general perception is that there must be kickbacks involved, somewhere along this food chain. He has one variety that’s okay tasting and the other dozen or so are atrocious, which the sales history will bear out, despite constant promotions. He even has his wife at one of the stores pretty much 24/7, demoing the stuff, and even then the movement is lackluster. Yet the next thing anyone knows, another pallet is parachuted into their midst, at every location, authorized from up top somewhere.

Furthermore, the guy is a major dickhead. There’s no chalking this one up to any kind of language barrier. Destiny has already told the guy to get out of her face — finding him not just an a-hole but also a sexist pig — and Edgar, in slightly softer language, has suggested he take a hike as well. This joker flew into the office one day, demanding to know why his wines weren’t on sale, when in fact the previous sale period had already ended. Then barked orders at him to put such and such bottles at various price points, now.

Edgar throws up his hands and shakes his head, says, “that’s not how we do things around here. Vendors don’t just come in here and tell me what to charge for things. Take it up with Duane.”

“Oh…okay,” the dude nods, effectively ending this particular debate.

Yet there is an additional angle that Edgar’s not mentioned to a soul who works here, primarily because he doesn’t want it taken the wrong way. Any suggestion whatsoever that there’s a conflict of interest, because no such conflict exists. But, well, yes, this point has recently reared its head, which is: his brother, who is a bartender, is dating one of the wine reps, Melanie. She and Edgar have kept this fact under wraps, and made every effort at downplaying their interactions at the store. She says she gets an allowance of 100 bottles a month to give away as free samples, and he’s been the beneficiary on a couple of occasions, but he would rather not have to explain any of this to the bosses. Would really like to avoid her altogether, on the job, because he doesn’t want any hint of favoritism to cloud his judgment. Not that it would, for nothing will change his mind that beer and wine here are totally overblown in their prominence, and he’s not going to alter the retails to favor her product lines. Still, there’s no reason to introduce even the tiniest seed of doubt.

Word is starting to get around about this department, anyway. Edgar hasn’t complained to anyone about it, only mentioned it to those handful of figures responsible, and maybe Duane, but it’s mere days after this comment from Dale, when Harry enters Edgar’s office with a strange request.

“Tell Pierre he’s not allowed to order any new wines.”

“He’s not allowed to order any new wines?”

Edgar repeats this to buy himself a second to think. Internally, he’s gloating at this pronouncement, because it confirms what he’s felt all along. Not to mention, one of the reasons his desk is constantly piled up with wine bottles is because Pierre has played the whole I’m so bad with technology! card and gotten out of sending new items spreadsheets. Which, truthfully, were so riddled with errors when he did send them, that Edgar figured this couldn’t be any worse, for him to just bring the item up here instead. But it’s still a time consuming hassle, either way.

“Yes. You tell him that. The back dock’s got so much wine we don’t have room for anything else. He needs to do something about this.”

“Well, okay, I mean…I can mention it to him, but I really don’t have any authority over the guy…”

“Alright, thanks,” Harry nods, and leaves, apparently accepting this.