The Horrors of Kwiksave: The Accusation and "Big Lad"

The Horrors of Kwiksave’ is a candid recollection of my memories working at Kwiksave (the now-defunct discount supermarket chain) as a 'Stock Lad'.

I wasted over FOUR years of my life in this maggot-infested hellhole and still occasionally wake up drenched in sweat after enduring a nightmare in which I am working there still.

Some of the names have been slightly changed simply to save my arse in case anyone takes offence at some of the details regarding my facts or opinions.

Many of the people mentioned are now dead as this happened so long ago, but their siblings are not.

This is the 'HIVE Special Edition' of a multi-part autobiographical story (with a little over-embellishment on some of the details) I posted on STEEM over 2 years ago.

It contains a LOT more detail and content than the original and will fill in many gaps that were missed the first time around.

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Other Articles in this Series:
Chapter One: A Prelude to the Best Job in the Land
Chapter Two: The Job Centre
Chapter Three: The Interview
Chapter Four: Christmas is Coming
Chapter Five: The Changing of the Blades
Chapter Six: The Staff
Chapter Seven: The Auxiliary Staff and The Load
Chapter Eight: The Sugar Maniac

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‘Some kids are best left to fend for themselves, and others were born to stack shelves’ – Steven Wilson


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Chapter Nine: The Accusation and "Big Lad"

...'July 1981'...

'WARNING: BAD LANGUAGE BELOW'

On yet another boring, monotonous, thrill-filled day I was filling up the butter section. In those days, butter mostly came packed in that silver or gold wrapping although those big plastic tubs did exist.

Using my stock knife, I slashed the top of the box damaging the packs of Lurpack butter in the process.


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This always happened and the damages section was persistently full of butter due to my negligence. To tell you the truth, I didn’t give a crap, and Mort didn’t seem to care or notice either.

Or did he?....


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The Accusation

A red-faced Mort came storming down one of the aisle’s making a beeline for me. It was early, the store was not busy but there were a few customers about.

I hurriedly covered up the top of the butter box hoping he would not notice using little subtlety.

There was never a, “How are things going”, or “Good Morning” or even the slightest glimmer of a smile but if Mort had one redeeming trait, he was always straight to the point.


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“Why didn’t you tell me you had a criminal record”, he demanded loudly enough for heads to turn.

So much for subtlety, that was the Mort style.

The accusation caught me by surprise but as I knew I had done nothing wrong, I figured I could talk my way out of this one.

What did shock me was that it had taken Kwiksave seven months to perform a simple basic criminal record check?

After explaining in my most sincere voice about Carrot, the interview and application form in earshot of several very nosey customers all listening with great interest to the drama, he gave me a long suspicious glare with those squinty eyes of his.

The silence lingered uncomfortably…., was this my time to be sacked?

I could visibly see the mental computation going through his head as those eyes bored into mine looking for any sign of weakness or guilt, and after what seemed like a full minute Mort made his decision.

“Well… we will have to keep you because you are trained up”, he piped up gruffly adding, “I’ll be calling Carrot to verify your story so you had better not be lying”

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After so much mental deliberation and exertion, he strode back to the office most likely to put his feet up and have a nap.

He couldn’t get rid of me and knew it. He would have to do some work, and getting suckers like me to do almost all of it was nigh impossible.

I heard no more about the criminal record check.


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"Big Lad"

Mort’s wife and kid used to visit sometimes. How this abhorrent, bullying tyrant had managed to charm ANY woman was quite beyond me but I could see it was so.

I can’t recall if she was a biffer, a babe, or something in between, most likely she was unremarkable.

The kid was a boy, appeared to be around 1.5-2 years old and like any father, he was insanely proud of his son.

“Big lad isn’t he”, he would say to me while adoringly watching his toddler grab a pack of bog rolls and throw them down the aisle followed by another and then another.

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...'the bog roll pallet was the easiest of easy work to stack; there was never the slightest doubt in my mind that Mort would make me pick up all the rolls his little urchin was throwing around everywhere'...

I don’t know how many times he said, “Big lad”, but it was like his mouth had gotten stuck, much like a defective piece of vinyl.

In response, I would generally generate a grunt, secretively roll my eyes and look completely bored. At the age of 18, I didn’t give a shit about Mort’s “Big lad”, and why was he suddenly talking to me?

“Tidy up that aisle…, get on with it”, he demanded after a few minutes suddenly noticing his darling little sprog had emptied around 20 packs of rolls all over the floor.

I suppose I should have felt lucky the little shit had not been throwing full jars of jam.


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To be continued...


Cover Picture is a combination of free sources from here and here, combined and edited with Luminar 4. Any unsourced images are my own.

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21 comments
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Lol. Good one. I was immersed in the Kwiksave experience, yet again! I am growing an increased hatred for Mr. Mort. I'm sure it wasn't the urchin's fault (as he surely didn't know any better), but having been a blood relative of Mr. Urchin Sr., it would be a miracle if he turned out better. Hopefully, he did! :P

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I have tried and failed to find Mort on Facebook and other social media to no avail, I do wonder what happened to him, or even if he's still alive. Things didn't end well at Kwiksave for him, but that story is for another day.

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Ugggghhh. Little Mort? It's almost more than the mind can take.

I'll just bet he had a less than stellar childhood. I wonder if he tortured small animals...

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I wonder if he tortured small animals...

The way he was going, he couldn't do any wrong.. whatever it was. Mort wasn't so big so I guess 'Big lad' wasn't going to be either. The 'Big lad' incident happened just once or twice, strange how you remember such things after such a long period of time?

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You know? Some things just leave a mark, even though it didn't seem much at the time. Have you considered Therapy?

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Oh.. I don't want these things removing from my head, you wouldn't be able to read about them then... right?

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in all fairness the blocks of lurpak butter were packed in tightly, but i think by the sounds of it you should have been restricted to the jam cage ( they were a bastard to do) or the tinned goods pallet. i'm surprised you lasted as long as you did!

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The jam cage was horrible, the tin goods looked bad but could be done quickly. What do you mean 'restricted'? I had to do all the work! I am not exaggerating.. this twat did nothing!

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😂 aww!
omg it must have been a small store i had an army usually of 4 stocklads to do my bidding!!!

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It was small, 4 aisles.. and I can still remember each in vivid detail. Soon I was not to be alone... next chapter.

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That is pretty horrible. I guess I am probably the same way with my dog though. She could be biting someone's leg off and I would be all "look at my pretty puppy".

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It was all a bad dream, wish I could say that was true!

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Oh my. Mort really does sound condescending to say the least. How did you manage to make it through each day without getting into some serious trouble?

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I tried my best to keep out of his way, as he loathed work and spent most of his life reading the newspaper in the office, I did OK!

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retail.. its fucking crap isnt it..

although, I did enjoy my time on nightshift.... no fucking customers and as many pepperami's as i could scoff lol

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It was a long time ago, but the scars are permanently etched into my head. Any job facing the general public is shit, and someone else but ME should do it!

I did one night shift while there, it wasn't much better but my memory is blurry.

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