While shopping at Walmart, a California man’s bizarre customer service experience has him and people online questioning whether it was an incident of racial profiling. And it all started when he bought an everyday product before checkout.
TikTok user Mike (MikewillcutSMP) posted his quick visit to Walmart and ruminated on a brief experience he had with an employee. On the way to pick up cuticle cutters, an employee had to put them in a security box.
Mike shows his cuticle cutters inside the security box, which definitely feels like overkill. Mike asked the employee, “Why didn’t the lady have to put her stuff in the box?” Just before him, a customer had purchased a similar bathroom product and didn’t get the same treatment.
The employee said it was store policy, even though both customers picked up their items in the same section. The employee tried to apologize to Mike for the inconvenience, but he didn’t accept that apology. He said, “Give me my item,” and walked away.
Now, he’s telling his audience, “This is what you have to go through at Walmart to get some cuticle cutters.”
Mike then records himself speaking with another employee, a manager, about what happened. He seemed very understanding, saying, “I know exactly what you’re talking about.” They apologize and promise to make it right. According to Mike, the “whole situation made me feel like I was being singled out and racially profiled.”
How viewers reacted to Mike’s TikTok video
“Why was the procedure different for me?” Mike asked in the description of his TikTok video. Unsurprisingly, Mike’s viewers leaned heavily on the side of his experience being racial profiling, arguing that putting cuticle cutters in a security box was overkill.
“That’s ridiculous. Racial profiling,” a TikTok user wrote. “I highly doubt that item is being stolen so much, they need to put it in a box.”
“I’m so glad you reported it to the manager,” another viewer wrote, validating Mike’s feelings of being “singled out.” The commenter got 50 Likes, including one from Mike.
“They did this to me and I’m white,” a user named Egg McMuffin wrote. Although some commenters thought OP was playing devil’s advocate, they defended themselves. “I hate that Walmart locks everything up,” and what drove them to avoid shopping at Walmart.
And their comment does confirm, as others have noted too, that it’s also a noticeable trend at Walmart. Some locations even lock up baby food, so an employee has to be flagged down before you can make a purchase. In Mike’s case, commenters feel as though it might be both!
