An Australian supermarket director made his feelings towards a toilet paper hoarder crystal clear when the man attempted to return nearly 5,000 rolls and expected to get a full refund.
John-Paul Drake, director of Drakes Supermarkets in Adelaide, recently posted a YouTube video in which he publicly slammed the selfish, “un-Australian” shopper for his “ridiculous” request.
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You probably remember that when the pandemic first began, people inexplicably flocked to grocery stores to stock up on toilet paper.
Many didn’t just stock up — they hoarded rolls and rolls of toilet paper, clearing entire shelves and leaving other customers with nothing else to do but buy paper towel and get creative.
Panic-buying was, and remains, a serious problem. Not only are people buying up all the toilet paper, but they’re also stockpiling hand sanitizer, face masks, and disinfectant wipes, among other things.
These are the customers who didn’t listen when officials discouraged people from hoarding, as retailers would remain open and available for shopping.
Instead, they filled their homes with hundreds upon hundreds of rolls of toilet paper, expecting to have the last laugh when things took a serious turn for the worse and such essentials as good ol’ t.p. became a luxury item.
Except that hasn’t happened. And now they’re stuck with all that toilet paper.
Which leads us to today’s story of a deeply regretful hoarder and an understandably unsympathetic grocery boss.
In his YouTube video , supermarket director Drake urged shoppers not to panic-buy, and told his viewers that one man recently realized why stocking up wasn’t such a good idea after all.
As he explained, the customer (or “un-Australian hoarder”, as he referred to him), called looking to get a refund on some items he’d purchased when the pandemic first began.
But it wasn’t just one or two things that he wanted to return.
“I had my first customer yesterday who said he wanted to get a refund on 150 packets of 32-pack toilet paper and 150 units of one-litre sanitizer,” Drake explained.
If you don’t feel like doing the math, allow me: 150 packages of toilet paper with 32 rolls in each amounts to a whopping 4,800 rolls .
As for how Drake handled the “ridiculous” request, he said he had one simple message for the regretful hoarder.
“I told him that,” he said, flipping the middle finger to the camera.
Simple yet effective. I like his style.
He continued, “That is the sort of person that is causing the problem in the whole country.”
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Watch the full video below.
In a later interview, Drake clarified that the man in question had bought up all the toilet paper to try and sell at inflated prices online.
As he told ABC Radio Adelaide , the customer had the help of a “team” of 20 stockpilers to buy up $10,000-worth of goods once people began panicking around 4 weeks ago.
But their resale plans were soured when websites like Amazon and eBay caught on to similar scams.
“In that conversation [the shopper said] ‘My eBay site has been shut down, so we couldn’t profiteer off that’,” Drake explained.
On YouTube, Drake’s video has gone viral, racking up hundreds of thousands of views since it was posted last week.
In the comments, people are praising the supermarket director for his blunt response to the hoarder who definitely didn’t deserve any sympathy, let alone a refund.
“Brilliant, just brilliant,” one user wrote. “This should be the default policy nationwide any time hoarders come looking for refunds. These people are shameless.”
Another added, “That was actually fantastic. Who would’ve thought I’d find a retail video highly entertaining. You’re a legend.”
