Woman: "Would you like to participate in some product surveys?"
Me: "Depends. What do I have to do?"
Woman: "It depends on your age. May I ask how old you are?"
Me: "Young."
Snicker. Snicker. She wasn't amused. I told her my age and she told me there were only three items on her list for my age group; bread, diet pepsi, and a movie. I didn't have time for a movie and I drink diet coke instead of diet pepsi so I opted for the bread. Then I asked if Madison could participate in something, but her age group wasn't scheduled for anything until Saturday.
Woman: "You could come back tomorrow."
She led us back the way we had just come to the back of the building and into a small room labeled Marketing just off to the side of the escalators. It was an ordinary room, the size and shape of a hallway, with white walls, navy blue carpeting, and matching chairs. A woman sat in a small cubicle with open windows much like a ticket booth. Our woman instructed us to sit down in the chairs while she conferred with the woman in the booth. Another woman with a clipboard and a short, fancy hair style was seated to the right of us asking questions of a heavy set woman whose daughter sat next to her playing on her phone. She and Madison exchanged mother/teenager nonsense looks and she went back to her phone.
I was instructed to wait for Phyllis, the woman with the short hairstyle and my woman disappeared back out the door to search for more workers. Phyllis finished with the heavy set woman, motioned for Madison and me to follow her, and she led us down a real hallway and into a small, crowded room with two tables that held computers, people seated around them as if conducting interviews, and a banquet table covered in a plastic, yellow tablecloth. She had me sit in the chair next to the banquet table and she sat across from me facing me. She turned a page on her clipboard and asked for my name which she wrote down. Then she handed me a loaf of Nature's Own 100% whole wheat bread.
Phyllis: "Take this bread. Hold it, look at it, exam it just like you would in the grocery store."
Me: "Ok, but I don't really need to do that since this is the bread that I buy. I wouldn't do anything to the bread in the store except pick it up and put it into my cart."
Phyllis began writing on the paper attached to the clipboard.
Me: "But I will exam the bread since I've never had the whole wheat before." I began squeezing the bread, turning the loaf over in my hands, peering intently at it while Madison giggled from her chair to the right of Phyllis. "Very soft. Looks delicious. Great bread. I buy it all the time. Well, not the whole wheat."
Phyllis: "Ok, so soft and delicious and what?"
Me: "Oh, you're writing down what I said?"
Phyllis: "Yes, yes. Soft and delicious and ?"
Me: "Well, Phyllis, I personally buy Nature's Own bread. In fact this is the only bread that I buy from the grocery that isn't made directly from Publix's bakery."
Phyllis: "Okay, good. Only bread that you buy that isn't from the bakery. What else?"
Me: "I buy this bread every week. Once a week. Only I buy the Honey Wheat bread. We eat a loaf once a week. I have never tried the 100% whole wheat type, but I should. I'm suppose to be eating whole wheat bread to help lower my cholesterol. Do you have a toaster? Maybe some butter? Then I could try it."
Phyllis: "A toaster. That's funny. You said Honey Wheat?"
Me: "I did. I like this bread and this brand. I don't buy anything else. Isn't that amazing that you picked the one company that I purchase from? I find this bread to be soft and as fresh as can be considering it sits on the shelves in the store. It's delicious and has plenty of preservatives that keep it fresh for the whole week."
Phyllis: "Wonderful! Look!" She held up the clipboard to show me that she had covered more then half the page on the paper. "A half a sheet."
Me: "Is that good?"
Phyllis: "Amazing. Excellent. Now...."
She snatched the bread from me, laid it down on the floor in the corner, stood up and yanked the yellow tablecloth off of the banquet table. Under the cloth were five other loaves of wrapped bread in various packages and of various types. They were for the most part the nastiest looking breads I had ever seen. Nasty. That was the first word that came to mind, but Phyllis wasn't interested in that.
Phyllis: "Now, looking at those breads on the table would you think that any of them were made from the same company as the first bread you examined."
Me: "No. I mean, look at these things." I began examining them, squeezing them. "Jeez. Have you felt this one there? This is so hard I could kill someone with one swing of this loaf. And this loaf here? Obviously, trying to copy the Nature's Own brand. Please."
Phyllis: "Funny." She threw the yellow tablecloth over the breads. "Thank you."
Me: "Thank you? That's it? Did I fail?"
Phyllis: "I don't have any idea. That's what the company wanted me to ask you. I did. Come this way."
She led us back through the maze of desks and people, back into the hallway, and back to where we had started to the woman in the booth. Phyllis informed the girl seated in there that I had participated in the bread.
Phyllis: "Look!" She held up the clipboard with the half filled paper to show the booth girl.
Girl: "Wow!" She passed me another clipboard. "Fill this out. Here's your $5.00. Thanks for participating."
Me: "Wait. You're giving me $5 for doing that?"
Girl: "Yep. Thanks for helping."
Me: "Well, do you have any more things you want me to try since I'm already here then? Diet Pepsi?"
Phyllis: "Funny. Thanks for helping out. You can exit this way."
So I did. Happy in the thought that I had contributed to the family's earnings this week. Happy that just maybe I had found a new career, trolling the malls for people with clipboards, and getting paid to sample different products to help out America's businesses.
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