Malled

by Kelly, Caitlin

• ISBN13: 9781591843801
• ISBN10: 1591843804
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2011-04-14
• Publisher: Portfolio

Summary

One woman's midcareer misadventures in the absurd world of American retail. After losing her job as a journalist and the security of a good salary, Caitlin Kelly was hard up for cash. When she saw that The North Face-an upscale outdoor clothing company-was hiring at her local mall, she went for an interview almost on a whim. Suddenly she found herself, middle-aged and mid-career, thrown headfirst into the bizarre alternate reality of the American mall: a world of low-wage workers selling overpriced goods to well-to-do customers. At first, Kelly found her part-time job fun and reaffirming, a way to maintain her sanity and sense of self-worth. But she describes how the unexpected physical pressures, the unreasonable dictates of a remote corporate bureaucracy, and the dead-end career path eventually took their toll. As she struggled through more than two years at the mall, despite surgeries, customer abuse, and corporate inanity, Kelly gained a deeper understanding of the plight of the retail worker. In the tradition of Nickel and Dimed, Malledchallenges our assumptions about the world of retail, documenting one woman's struggle to find meaningful work in a broken system.

Table of Contents

Author's Note	p. ix
Introduction	p. 1
I Seek Refuge, At the Mall	p. 9
Settling in	p. 19
Fitting in	p. 49
Holiday Shopping Begins: Deck the Halls, Not the Customers!	p. 71
The Good News	p. 87
Weathering The Recession	p. 111
Neglect and Disrespect	p. 141
This Job Can Kill You	p. 155
Cogs in the Machine	p. 163
Whose Idea was this?	p. 175
Customers from Hell	p. 181
The End of My Rope	p. 197
Epilogue	p. 221
Acknowledgments	p. 225
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