What the hell did you do? You sent a shut down the bathroom,
So I clawed the toilets with a bunch of salamian shot glasses. I did
like hitting it out of order sign on the door. Okay, yeah,
well I wish you would have just said that, Oh my god, is
this give me water? Am I gonna get hepatitis? Welcome to Cloud nine,
a Superstore podcast. I'm Jason and I'm BB and we're talking about Superstore
season six, episode twelve, Customer Satisfaction, which aired on March eleventh,
twenty twenty one. Directed by Matt Son and written by Bridget Kyle and Vikilu,
who have written a lot of episodes, but they're also the writing team
behind Bo and Cheyenne, Oh Cool salt'so chaotic Energy. Yeah, it really
was. Of course, if you want to write to us with any thoughts
you have to share, you can find us by email or Facebook or Twitter
and all that stuff, you know, the drill. So what do you
think it was? Okay, it was interesting. They definitely took it in
a different direction that I thought when I thought of customer satisfaction, What do
you think of I mean, I do think of those surveys. I thought
it was interesting that they never addressed the surveys because, yeah, because in
a corporate environment, you are told to push the survey and the customer cards
that they offer, so like, that's a lot of quotas that need to
be met, and I'm surprised it never came up in the past. It
would have been more realistic or more like believable. I guess if they said
that that doesn't really matter. Nobody reads those or you know, we don't
really like those things like that, like more honest than I never heard of.
It is this new what service? The link at the bottom of every
receipt? Huh? Is that no been there for years because it isn't new,
Like everywhere you go there's a fucking survey at the bottom of your receipt.
So it was just a little bit of a hard pill to swallow as
a retail worker. I thought it was funny. You did, okay?
Well, I just thought like it would be like, yeah, like they
don't care, like they're apathetic, and then they could like read everything that
everyone said, because that would have been funny too, to go through like
old receipts of like past episodes like it looks like a tornado hit the store.
Bad review, Like shit like that, you know, I found a
baby in on a potty in the kids section. Bad review. What I
found unrealistic was like, even with the big push to get people to do
the surveys, like what percentage of people are actually going to do them?
Yeah, very small, like fraction of people, and they're acting like they're
getting responses to the surveys all day long. Yeah, And I don't know
for me, like it is mostly either like I think I've mentioned this in
the last episode, where it's like you kissed their ass from the beginning to
the end, or they were pissed off and you did something to trigger them
and they were just angry. And that's the people that do the surveys.
It's either really grateful, really like great like amazing customer service, or I
fucking hate this bitch, fire her. That's kind of where you go.
And I thought it was funny when they showed Sandra doing the survey for that
older man, Yeah, because that is kind of funny, Like that is
kind of how it is, where it's like you have to be tech savvy
to do the survey right, so you do cut off a lot of potential
customer like reviews when you do it that way. Then the fact that she
gave herself one star when he's not gonna know what she actually submitted. So
again, it's out of five stars. I meaning I helped you a lot
today. Are sure you want to go with two? Let's go with one?
Classic, Sandra, You're like most of the other employees would have just
hit five. Yeah, maybe not Marcus, but Marcus is a dummy.
Two. Well, Marcus isn't supposed to be interacting with the customers. He's
supposed to be in the back. Yes, And there was a very clear
divide after the surveys come in of like back a house, front of house
people uh huh. And Jonah is so shook that he's not a front of
house persons. This is ridiculous. I don't belong with this group. I
have people skills, not saying you guys don't, but kinda he's a shadow
person. Yeah. I love this. This episode really highlighted Cheyenne and Sandra.
It did. Yeah. I noticed that Cheyenne had a lot more speaking
rules and she was taking on leadership position and she was hanging out with the
leadership. Yeah, and that was kind of a small detail, but I
really liked that they had a little meeting with Cheyenne and Dina and Glenn.
M hmm. She's like, aren't you freaking out that you're going to lose
your job? And they're like, oh wait, and she's like, oh,
well you are now. Uha Ceanne. You can monitor the surveys on
the app. If one of our people gets even one bad review, I
want you to pull them off the floor as fast as you can and shave
them, what like shave their head to shame them so they know they did
something bad. So it was good to see her. It was a little
clumsy in the beginning. It kind of felt like a little forced to me
when she started talking during their meeting, like with the whole store in the
morning meeting, because she's not standing up with them. She's sitting down with
a crew, right, So that felt a little weird and awkward because you
can tell that she's trying to get like that leadership kind of role, but
she's sitting down with the people, so there's not I think it's important when
you do that, Like it would have been good if she stood up or
did something to kind of differentiate herself pull herself up from the ranks in a
visual way because she's wearing the same outfit as they are. So and she
wore the correct shoes for this episode. Did you notice, Yeah, everyone
was getting their pants wet, like up the calves. Yeah. She was
wearing her like rubbery rubberized ugs, so she was basically like not getting dirty
peepee water on her pants. Do you want to talk about that first,
the flooding, yeah, or do you want to like get into front of
house back of house because that's kind of the main but we already started on
that, so let's talk about that, okay. And what it reminded me
of is working in theater and you have the people that are in the light
and the people that are backstage, the actors and the set people. Yeah,
and I like that there are people that were proud to be the backstage
people because that's me. Yeah. Sandra was really proud and actually like embodied
her like personhood in a really impactful way. I thought, don't get down.
I was so so we got put in the back. It doesn't mean
we're worthless, no, I know, you're right. It just means we're
back of house people. Strong, silent shadow people. She named herself in
a way that wasn't disparaging to her fellow like shadow folk. But Jonah,
you could tell he had, you know, a tinge of like pride still
and being able to talk to people or whatever. Yeah, and he kind
of was super rude to all of these people who are not traditionally good with
people. Some of them we kind of understand why people wouldn't want to be
around them, Like that racist guy. It's so inappropriate. He was like
even but even he knew, like, you shouldn't tell a woman, you
shouldn't make comments about a woman and her eating habits. They don't like that.
Yeah, it's no big deal. Some people just thought that you've talked
too much, like way too much. Actually, one lady said that you
accused her of having non nonnoms. They don't like it when you come and
on what the brother And that was something that I was like, Oh,
Jonah, why are you talking to people this way? What do you think?
Do you think Jonah's like too much? I think the fact that he
was trying made him go overboard, and if he was able to just be
a little more of his normal self, I assume he's probably pretty good with
customers, you don't think so you're shaking your hand. Hey, I know,
I don't like Jonah. I never really liked him. He always comes
off as super arrogant or like, I don't know, like he doesn't really
talk at people, or he talks at people, not with them, you
know what I mean. So it just doesn't feel like he would actually be
receptive to customer needs. But that's just my opinion. I don't know.
I don't know. I feel like he's good with the customers, and is
the arrogance comes across more and like conversations with the people closer to Yeah,
like telling people that he doesn't belong with them in the back. They're just
doing busy work. The guy asking about the steaks, and he can kind
of use his uh, like I don't know, hipstery knowledge of like what's
going to be better in one situation or another to actually like help them make
a good decision. Actually, yeah, I'm trying to choose between a ribbi
and a sir one steak. I'm having dinner with my tree guy. Any
recommendations, Well, you're going to get a richer flavor from the marbling and
the RIBI, So if it were me, I'd go with that. Yeah.
I mean, what I really want to know is who's this tree guy?
Like, do you take your tree guy to a steak dinner like you
treat What kind of trees is he like cutting the trees? Is he planning
the trees? I honestly don't remember, but I'm certain we've seen that customer
before with other like weird comments like that. Yeah, yeah, I guess
I just yeah, Jonah. It very much seems to remind me of the
pilot episode where Jonah is too good to be working at this store. That's
it. Yeah, And it's like almost like he hasn't changed that much.
Yes, And Sandra calls him out hard at the end of this because initially
he's like, this is just busy work. This is nobody work. I'm
not a nobody. Y'all are nobodies, but I deserve to be in the
front, you know, I'm in the limelight. And he gets in trouble
for not working. He like leaves his station and then he lure he like
sings his siren song about like how everybody now is just like him in terms
of like undervalued and they deserve a break and all this shit. In fact,
let's get out of here, Let's go outside and enjoy the day.
Let's value our own worth and take the day back. And when Cheyenne finds
out, she's like, you realize that because of the flooding, like a
bunch of merchandise is potentially damaged. Dona made us go outside and relax.
We didn't want to know. You came alive out there, Justine, don't
lie. Well, do you at least finish the special assignment? There was
just a bunch of busy work. Yeah, but if you didn't move those
boxes onto the shelves, then they were probably damaged in the flood. And
that was like all new Zephyr products. So that's like really bad and like
that's fucked up because you your one job was to make sure that those boxes
weren't on the floor but up on a shelf. And Sandra like lost it.
And I loved her dialogue in that, like saying, how like Jonah
doesn't really understand what it is to be a shadow person and she's proud to
be who she is and that he doesn't deserve to be back there and he
gets kicked out and that was kind of like just desserts. I just wanted
you to understand that we are all better, that's the thing, not better
than the work. I'm a shadow person and I like it, so well,
yeah, we'll get back there and assess them. No, you know
what, you don't wanted in the back. And there's also this understanding that
he lacks, like just because you're not like a people person, you're not
your maybe your social skills aren't the highest, doesn't mean you're not valuable in
other ways. And yeah, an important part of the team regardless. Yeah,
he's kind of ablest in that way, because you know what I mean.
And I think that's what really rubbed me the wrong way about this whole
situation with Jonah, because some people don't know how to take social cues or
talk to people strangers, you know, complete strangers about anything. Even when
you have the buffer of like them asking a question and you knowing the answer,
it can still be intimidating or not in not in your capabilities to do
that. That doesn't mean you're less of a person or that you're not valuable
or whatever. So it was it was just kind of really upsetting, and
it just kind of reminded me why I don't like Jonah just like the first
episode. Yeah, but it's kind of weird just because I feel like Jonah's
character has been humbled over the seasons and he's come to like not see like
working at a big box store like this as something that's beneath him, and
he's tried to step up and kind of fight for everyone's rights there. Yeah,
so it kind of sucks to see him like be little still ye,
seeing himself on a higher tier than some of the other employees. Right,
he never went back to business school, He never did anything that he said
he was going to set out to do to better himself in any way.
And yeah, I thought that he had at least evolved a little bit,
but it seems like this was a step backward for him in a big way,
which was I'm not going to say disappointing, because I think this kind
of speaks to how a lot of people don't change at the very core when
you're like challenged with like you know, you're not seen as a person who's
worthy of running a register or whatever. Like his true self came out and
he's not better for it. Nobody is. Well. I think progress in
character growth isn't always just moving forward one direction. I think you'll find you
still hold on to old concepts and things. And yeah, it's just weird
because I personally thought that we were over this, Jonah, but for him
to kind of go all the way back to step one, Like did he
always need Amy or like another character to kind of put him in line?
And why does it always have to be a person of color that kind of
snaps him back into morality because it's always either Amy Garrett and now Sandra sucks.
Yeah? Interesting, right, Yeah, so that's Jonah. Do you
want to talk about mateo, say that Jeff came back. We have a
new district manager who is here and excited to meet all of you. He's
not new, it's Jeff. Oh come on, and I have the Tiger
queue up. I was going to do a whole thing, you mean,
run in while I have the Tiger. Was playing Jeff with a beard and
he's running two districts, which is honestly like spreading a mother thin right,
Like that's a lot, Like I don't know why he's so proud of that.
That sounds terrible. So I like that. Jeff mentions that their store
twelve seventeen is the problem Child's Store and list off all these issues that we've
seen on the show's that supposed to make There's been some chatter that twelve seventeen
is a problem Child's Store. What I mean, it did damage the store's
servers, there's the raccoon infestation, there's Carol's laws. Soit not to mention
them multiple attempts at unionizing. Well, yeah, of course it's going to
sound bad when you just rattle them off in a row like that, But
if you intersperse them with good things we've done or just you know, random
trivia. Yeah, and then when they talk about putting things that are positive
in between, they don't come up with anything either to like counterbalance all the
bad random facts. Yeah. Yeah, Jeff was a surprise, And then
that kind of tangled up with Mateo. Yeah, Garrett gets kind of wrangled
into cause Garrett and Mateo are talking about the engagement scheme that they kind of
started in the previous episode with Amy's parents and or not just Amy, but
Amy and Eric's parents. Right, So they're talking about the engagement and Jeff
kind of stumbles into their conversation and instead of owning up to the fact that
Matteo is getting engaged and he wants to propose. He says, Garrett's going
to do that to Dane, Diana Leanna, some fake woman. Garrett,
why do you call me man? Yeah? Sorry, probably because I've never
called you before. Yeah, I know, what's up with that? What
is going on with Jeff Man? Because he's like got subar ru's plural.
Yes, So he's obviously I think we have seen him before going through a
midlife crisis. So now we're just kind of in the after effects. And
maybe this like jeweler is like part of that. Maybe he like got a
pinky ring or like something, you know what I mean. Well, he
said he got hit by the jeweler like in his car. Oh yeah,
Oh him a fake that's right. Yeah. So, like Matteo is saying
that he's like more mature and doesn't need to interact with Jeff, but really
he's avoiding him and deflecting. Yeah, and I think part of it is
because Jeff was such a bitch about Mateo dating in general in the past.
Yeah, and I get that, like he's here for a day, I
can just not deal with this, right, But then eventually they send Garrett
sets it up. So Matteo has to be the one who spends time with
Jeff to divert his attention from the catastrophe that was them trying to get better
a customer engagement. Yes, so Jeff is like lying about his boyfriend and
you know, just playing up his life to you guy, Let's talk more
about that, as Jeff would do, and Matteo just snaps and spills all
of the beans about what is actually going on in his life, and that
just kind of breaks Jeff. Yeah, I thought they were going to do
something that was going to be regrettable for a minute. Yeah, I thought
about that, but it didn't really feel like it to me. No,
but it was super awkward. There was like the way that Matteo was placing
his hand on the desk felt super weird and awkward, and I wish they
would have either just held hands and got it over with or Matteo would have
just pulled back because that was too much for me, because I know Matteo
is a ruthless motherfucker, Like, deep down, he has a weird pass
that we don't talk about. He watched his twin brother drown. There's like
this whole other story to a tale that we do not talk about, and
he was just a little too vulnerable for that character, you know what I
mean, Like he should have been cold and cunning in a way that would
have aligned more with this person who wanted to steal babies and put him in
the back, just saying don't give me one character and then not let him
be just super cunning and cold, because it would have been great to see
that, like him being like, well, I'm sorry for you for having
a fake life, like you're a great boyfriend and everything, but I'm still
better off you are. Like that would have been like Sheef's kiss, Like
sure you can show sympathy, but you always put yourself top. Because that's
Mateo in my opinion, in my mind, he's always that competitive person who's
got to be better. Yeah, but I think it can be vulnerable,
especially if it's someone he was in a relationship with for a couple of years.
Yeah. I mean, he would have almost been the one who could
have married Mateo too, if Matteo would have been honest, right, But
to me, that shows like how hard it would be for Mateo to still
be honest even to the stay. He doesn't show all his cards That's why
it was weird that Matteo was reaching out but not Jeff. I would have
liked to see it the other way around, where Jeff is reaching out and
Mateo stays cold. But that's just like super like almost insignificant, like body
placement, Like I would have been the only one to notice that. Maybe
you know what I mean, but I just I'm like a really like I
feel like body language is so loud sometimes that it can be really utilized to
tell a story without words. Well, there's a part of me that was
kind of expecting, like Jeff to reach over touch Mateo's hand or something like
that, right because it was right there. I was not expecting Matteo to
be into it at all, like right he was a place where he would
backslide or anything like that. No, no, I didn't want him to,
but it was just weird to see Mateo being the one to reach out
and and uh, Jeff not doing anything about it. Like that was weird
to me because I feel like Jeff is super thirsty. Jeff would have been
the first one to grab his hand, and Matteo would have been like,
oh, hell no, I'm married, I'm getting married, bitch, Like
you know what I mean, Like it was just I feel like it could
have been something that they said without saying, and it was like a missed
opportunity that made Matteo a lot softer in a way that I'm not comfortable with
having him be so soft when in one scene he's talking about stealing children and
hiding them in the back, and the other scene he's like comforting this guy
that he saw for a couple of months or years or whatever. Yeah,
but I mean there's got to be some level of trust between them, because
like they're not trying to hide Mateo's work situation with the Vision Center and all
that like that, Well they can't. They can't. I mean, he's
he's implicated. I think he very much knows that he assisted in that whole
situation. Jeff is a part of it. If Mateo goes down, I
mean Matteo already went down for a lot of it, But if Mateo goes
down anymore with Cloud nine, Jeff is implicated, and so is what's his
name, old guy Glenn and Amy even and the eyeglasses guy. Like there's
a lot of people that would go down with him him, So him staying
where he is is really important, and I think it just would make sense
for me if Jeff's character cared more about Mateo than Mateo cares about jeff'scare and
it just wasn't there. I don't think it's gonna work out between us,
but you were a really good boyfriend, and honestly, I don't know anyone
who takes better care of their supers. It was good to see them,
but it just felt like the drama wasn't there. I feel like we're really
down on this episode, but I actually really enjoyed it and it has a
lot of fun. It was funny. It was like ridiculous, and I
think most of that came from the antics of the customer satisfaction survey. Yes,
and what led up to the store shutting down, And that was where
most of the comedy came in for me. Was that whole situation. So
what kind of problems are we supposed to be making for the customers, Like
you guys are out of cheese problems or oh my god, my baby was
stolen problems, So we're supposed to stash a bunch of stolen babies in the
back. Gross? Actually I don't think it's that gross. Wait, I
want kids. The fact that they didn't know what the fuck to do,
and how they kept getting shitty scores because they're just doing regular customer service,
right, And then they saw that the best customer survey they got was when
they were doing a problem solved. There was a problem and they fixed it.
So then they decided to create problems for customers that weren't even there.
Hide popular items in the back. Then when people ask for them, you
can find the last one. Take away the shopping baskets, but offer to
carry their stuff for them. Let's also shut down the customer bathrooms. We'll
let them use the employee bathroom and they'll feel like kings. I'll do it,
lynch pin of the operation in your face, Garrett, all the sabotaging
and hiding items and the bathroom situation, which is the one that escalated.
Yeah, do you want to talk about that whole bathroom situation, how it
came to be. I want to talk about the fact that bathrooms have drains.
Anywhere there's a water source in the store like that as a drain.
Yep, we've seen them. When I was a kid, I always wanted
to pee down the rain instead of use the toilet because I thought it was
like way more efficient and wasteless water. Right, But I was a weird
kid, But yeah, you're right. So Cloud nine doesn't have an up
to code bathroom, right, and they let Marcus be the what was it
the lynchpin? What is that? What is the lynchpin? What does that
mean? You don't have him, the whole operation falls apart. But it
was the opposite with him, because you had him, the whole operation fell
apart. I didn't understand the reference for lynchpin, but it seemed like a
bad idea to have him have any sort of rule and no oversight at all.
Right, just hang a sign. Yeah they did that with the pizza,
and Glench just started giving away free hot dogs. How much money do
you think they lost in hot dogs? They're not that expensive, No they're
not. But yeah, so the full store starts to flood and they don't
know what to do about it. And my favorite part was when Glenn was
like trying to find ways to block the warehouse and employee area from the regular
store with like towels and paper towels and all these other things, and it
wasn't working, so he decides to lay down don't get anywhere else. No,
it's not working. It was so funny and horrifying, and he got
so wet and I can't believe it, Like his hair was so messed up.
At the end of this episode, Eddie, because he's drenching, he
walks out to see Jeff and he's like, what happened? He kind of
pretended that he didn't know what the hell was going on. What the are
you hitting me? I mean, what the wrong with the store? Oh
my god? What happened here? Jeff? Did you do this? And
while all this is happening, the back crew is just sitting in the back
like sipping on La croix. It was such a funny episode. It was
good and I was so happy that they brought Jeff back for this is fun.
Yeah, and I'm glad they didn't focus on actual customer satisfaction. Instead,
it was like focused on chaos because I hate customer satisfaction so much.
Who's focused on the employees? Yeah, trying to Yeah, so I feel
like they're maybe laying the groundwork that this store is going to be closing for
the finale of the show. Did you feel that way? No, I
mean it kind of seems like a natural ending to a series. Yeah,
for all that money that they're spending, that makes sense. Yeah, the
store will be closed for a few days to repair all the water damage.
That's not good for quarterly numbers, not to mention all the customer complaints we're
getting about being splashed with peepy water, and they brought up like all the
issues of stores had and then they have this big flooding incident. Yeah,
how many more? How many more episodes till it's over? Over? There's
three more? Yeah, I guess they could. They could totally shut down
the store and then like reopen the store or say it's a new store,
because we don't know anything, like they're you know, these stores are so
generic. So when Cheyenne has her own show, they can still use the
set and just say it's a different store altogether with a slightly new cast.
Yeah. I don't know if the spin off will have be set in the
store at all. I mean, why not why not use a couple of
those seats, Like you have the set, You spent how many thousands of
dollars on this set? Why not use it every once in a watch because
they're going to take it down and use it for other shows. That's still
sad, yeah, because I mean if it was just set in the Store
and still Superstore, that's the same series. Okay, Well, I just
I guess I'm just super sad about the Superstore being super over. Three more
episodes, y'all. What are we going to do after this? Maybe take
a break and reassess our lives, or start the episodes from the beginning and
watching it with us, since we have this whole archive of us listening and
watching. We've got a message from John in Australia. What says love the
pod guys, appreciate your insights into the show and how it intersects with contemporary
America. You've made me like it even more and given me pause for thought.
Oh wow, thanks John. I hope Australia is treating you well.
America sucks. I just say, COVID sucks. I don't know. It's
sad that this show is ending, but it is very contemporary and I'm glad
that we're able to give you some sort of insight on the Midwest. We
don't get a lot of focus in media really, except for like being portrayed
as ignorant, fat white assholes. Parts of the country that you avoid.
Yeah, the flyover states as they call them. So yeah, yeah,
thank you for that message. I always hope that people listening to this that
it enhances their experience of watching the show. I know it does for me.
Very self indulgent kind of thing to do to have a podcast, I
think, but I'm glad that. Yeah, other people can self indulge with
me. I guess. I mean, it's definitely something we wouldn't do if
we didn't enjoy it. Yeah, but you know, we don't like push
this on like our friends or anybody like. The people that find this podcast
are people who like the show. Yeah, it's very organic. Yeah.
I don't tell people I have a podcast in general, let alone two to
three. It's a secret podcast. I use an alias so I can say
whatever the fuck I want without worrying about people like finding me in real life,
which I appreciate. So thank you for letting me be me and keep
listening. We have other things in the works that are happening. Indeed,
the next episode will air on March eighteenth. It is called Lowell Anderson,
a name I don't recognize, so I assume it comes from the show.
And then they released the names of the final two episodes. That's going to
mention those as well. Oh what are they? Episode fourteen is called Perfect
Store, and then episode fifteen is called All Sales Final, Oh shit,
which I think kind of feeds the theory that it's over closing. It's closing.
My goodness, how many hundreds of jobs are going to be out?
Like you know they have more than fifty employees. Oh, I'm so sad.
Oh I hope they get a pension. I doubt it. I want
to see a memorial for Myrtle. I know they did one before, but
they need to do another one. Show some goddamn respect, that's right,
And maybe in the last episode Brett will say words what if it ends with
him, like giving a big, eloquent speech, that'd be beautiful. The
Machine speaks. And then finally NBC confirmed America for Era's return for The Great
I know you're really into. I mean it makes sense. Do you think
it'll be a wedding episode. I want it to be a wedding episode.
I don't know, because they're not moving like super fast with Mateo's engagement.
But they could also do some sort of time jump or maybe it's some sort
of like engagement party instead of the wedding. I don't know. I don't
know either, but I think Mateo needs to get married asap before he gets
deported. Because you think Joe Biden's not deporting motherfuckers, You're wrong, so
wrong. Well, I guess that is it for this episode. If you
look at the bottom of the notes, you'll find that there's a customer satisfaction
survey you can take for the podcast, and we really need you to give
us five stars. There. Yeah, our boss reads all of those and
if we don't get good reviews, he will whip us. Yes, and
not in a good sexy way, in a bad, scary way. I
have a heavenly day. Have a heavenly day. Attention Cloud nine Chopper.
You can support us by subscribing to the podcast and leaving a rating or review.
Find us on Facebook and Twitter at Superstore Pod. You can also email
us at Superstore Podcast at gmail dot com. Have a heavenly day. Sorry,
bathroom's close, but you're gonna love the employee bathroom. Come on,
I'll show you. I gotta dump one out too,