The job: Stock boy – Venture

My age: 16

Hourly wage: $4.50

Oh Venture. My time with you was short and not sweet .

Venture was like a bad Walmart.

There was a food court, and poorly lit aisles with all kinds of discounted items.

This one of a few jobs that I held during 1991.

It was a discount store without a soul.

I think we competed with K-Mart, but were not nearly as good – and that is saying something.

My memories of this time are very limited, but I did enjoy crushing boxes in the box crusher – that was always fun and could take a lot of time.

Venture was about a 10 minute drive away from my home and I do remember shifts did not go by quickly. Working in retail is hard. You don’t get paid much, and you are constantly tempted to buy things you don’t need – with your employee discount.

I don’t think I lasted here very long and neither did Venture.

Venture went bankrupt 1998 and I can see why.

Just look at the logo.

My main lessons learned here were don’t tie yourself to a retail chain that has a black and white zebra logo.

Carpe Diem my friends!