USA - SWIM's Experience Working at a Headshop in the US

[Graduisic]

sources not allowed, but i can speak of swim's experience working at a headshop in the united states (strictest drug law, particularly in swim's region; very sneaky drug task force), no disclosure about the company as well to maintain all privacy and self-incrimination.

swim worked at a headshop for 6 months. and the following mind-altering products were made/purchased in bulk by his owners:

Chronic Salvia - 5x-80x standardized extracts in different aromas (strawberry, watermelon, tropical rum blueberry, etc.) made by swim's owners; purchasers would have to sign a legal disclosure that this was sold for incense purposes only, releasing the company from legality issues if the customer abused the product, also an ID was required to verify the customer was of legal age to purchase the product. a legal binding contract

Amanita Muscaria Grade A Caps Without Stems - Sold by the ounce, purchased in bulk from an unknown vendor even to swim. Another legal disclaimer was signed, as these were sold for ornamental purposes only.

A unique product that was sold as an herbal incense; a product unique to the company so the name will not be disclosed. it was sold as incence, but came in filled, swallow-able caps. of course these were not intended to be swallowed; as was said in the disclosure, it was for incense purposes. not even the owners would not tell swim what was the main ingredient in them, but later, he found from employees that were there much longer that it was the research chemical TFMPP (in some natural form)?

swim is unsure of the legality of the last prodcut, this was partially why he left this job; too dangerous to work there long-term in the U.S.; too much scrutiny.

there was a painfully long list of words that people are not allowed to say in the store (bong [waterpipe is the correct term], kief [pollen is the correct term], and about 20 other words at least, reference to drug abuse, talking about the effects of any of the products swim sold, any of these were grounds to throw the customers out the door.

any other questions swim would be happy to enlighten

Reputation Comments on this post:

	thanks for sharing inside info :)
	Interesting, thanks.

[Alfa]

Many thanks for this great information. Could you please expand on the words SWIY was not allowed to use and the words that where used as replacement for them?

Please answer this thread:
Is there a headshop branch organization in the USA?

[Pondlife]

Originally Posted by Graduisic

Chronic Salvia ... purchasers would have to sign a legal disclosure that this was sold for incense purposes only, releasing the company from legality issues if the customer abused the product, also an ID was required to verify the customer was of legal age to purchase the product.

It seems a bit strange that they said "this is incense" and also required age verification. Perhaps they had a lawyer advising them, but on the face of it the age verification would seem to indicate that they knew it was not just incense. After all, there are no age restrictions on joss sticks at the local Asian store are there?

[Graduisic]

Originally Posted by Pondlife

It seems a bit strange that they said "this is incense" and also required age verification. Perhaps they had a lawyer advising them, but on the face of it the age verification would seem to indicate that they knew it was not just incense. After all, there are no age restrictions on joss sticks at the local Asian store are there?

By law in his region, he was not allowed to have anyone enter the store under the age of 18, so verification that the purchaser of this controversial "incense" was in fact over the age of 18; swim wishes he could dig up one of the release forms and scan it. swim might go in there and purchse a cheap product and ask for a copy of the legal release form so one could see what it was. part of it included that the substances may be poisonous and are not intended for human ingestion; releasing the company of any legal responsibility if one were to ingest this purchased product (the same form was used for all three forms of incense and onramental mushrooms. for it to be a legal, valid document that if it were presented to the judge, it would include the following:

Detailed name of the product sold,
swim had to ask for his ID, and write the customer's date of birth and sign that it was swim who verified this.
Printed name and signature of the customer + the date on which the product was purchased.

Legal matters arose early in the company, swim heard, when his owner was being a little lax on the legality of salvia, and had been giving out free samples in the store. as time goes by, the paranoia of the owners went up and up. they opened a new store (making them the owners of three local headshop), their paranoia was to the point where swim and his staff were then required to ID all customers at the door, or it was an immediate boot. ended up turning away a lot of 15-17 year olds who were only coming in to look. some other shops in the area do not do this. other shops that weren't ones that he worked for, were more strict. if a group of people coming in and one person out of that group was actually going to purchase something, the entire group had to be ID'd or the whole group would be ejected from the shop. swim has come to understand that this isn't because it's illegal for someone who is underage to look around in an herbal smoking accecories store, it is just the paranoia of the shop-owners. in swim's owners free-time, they would watch the security tapes the WHOLE length of the day (10 hour shifts for swim, he worked full-time) for all three stores, so swim felt paranoid all the time, the cameras were like lasers burning into him wherever he was in the store.

As the paranoid continued, write-ups got more and more frequent. for small things, like being 5 minutes late to a meeting that was called a half hour before it begins, formal write-ups were taking place.

How swim got fired:

A friend came in and was asking swim if he could hook up some pot. swim was supposed to, by the rules, kick his friend out, but instead i tried to make her get quiet so she could stay in the store and tell her "no, i can't help you out". on swim's write-up for the day he got fired, one of the things included swim's friend asking him "So, you can't help me out?" NEITHER the owners of swims store confronted him about the situation at the time, even though they were RIGHT there. just this awkward silence...

The next day they took their insane inventory scheme to the next level. swim was told when his owners arrived (it was very odd to ever see them at all, much less two days in a row, swim knew something was up because the awkward silence was still there). they had swim inventory, and put new bar code stickers with 4-digit codes on every single item in the store except for the over a thousand glass pipes in the store. this included, counting thousands of pipe screen packs, many hookah hoses, vaporizers, cans of ozium, digital scales, hanging postal scales, detox drinks, smoking charcoal, weigh and bag 25 bags of 18 different kinds of herbs, and slap those vile stickers on those too. anywhoo there is a LOT of crazy random shit in a headshop, and even though they helped a little, it was SWIM's responsibility to do that, not when part-time help comes in, not when another full-timer was working. swim felt that pattern for about a month

the next day, swim came to work and was doing a kickass sales job. made them what they usually made in a full day in about 2 hours. then swim sees their gas-hog of a vehical pull up and this time its just the one owner. after selling about $400 worth of merchandise in like 5 mintues, when all the customers left, she locked the door and put a note on the front.

She fired swim because of a girl saying "so, you can't help me?" to swim and they suspected swim was dealing from the store the whole time, and that the day before when swim was retagging everything, he smelled of marijuana.

Neither of the two incidences that happened did they call swim on it and make him explain what happened. i mean good god why couldn't they have told him "why do you smell like pot?" and swim would've gotten fired on the spot, the only problem was

SWIM NEVER dealt from the store. swim talked about drugs there, yes, but to employees and the owners themselves, not the customers swim didn't know. and swim did not have marijuana in his posession at all on the day they said he smelled like it. he hadn't smoked it in two days. he had no illegal paraphernelia or marijuana itself in his posession at the time.

swim would find it a rare thing to find working at a headshop to be a long-term job. swim's good friend and coworker got thrown into all this cuz she picked up 2 ounces of weed at closing time the night before. She, too, got fired, and swim doesn't know what his owner said to her, but she and i will never speak to each other again. we were got really close over the 6 months swim worked there.

so, to summarize: a short-term, low paying job, a little scuff on swim's resume because he got terminated, and a relationship with a good friend, destroyed.

people always came in to the shop and say to swim "wow, it must be totally fucking awesome to work here." he would hear someone say that at least three times a day during 4x 10-11hour shifts per day for 6 months

6 Months of HELL


oh and alfa, i will try to dig up swim's copy of that form from when he got hired. if that no longer exists, i'm sure swim will be able to remember most of them; albeit some of them obscure. Google is both swim and my friend

Reputation Comments on this post:

	Thanks for taking the time to share this. This sort of personal experience tale is very valuable to the forum.
	Awesome write-ups and information, sir. Seriously appreciated.

[Alfa]

Many thanks for the long write up. It is very interesting to read an inside story about how a US headshop works. More information is very welcome.

How do headshops handle contact with authorities? Do cops or other authorities come into headshops? What happens then?

[Graduisic]

well, the relationship betweeen cops and headshops are a pretty disconnected relationship. Let's say, for example, swim or one of his coworkers had experienced a shoplifting incident. police would not be contacted; the rationale behind this from his owners would be that since the item stolen (usually a pipe) was going to be used for illegal purposes anyway. swim kinda thought that the whole store kind of keeps the police economy going; stocking their evidence lockers with pipes sold from swim's store and i'm sure they were issuing fines like crazy.

the drug task force in the area is VERY sneaky and underhanded. undercover cops may have come in and called on many seperate occasions. swim never had any problems with any authorities when it came to making sure everyone in the store was of age; the drug task force seemed to be more interested in "listening in" on whether or not there was reference to any drug use (marijuana in particular) inside, near the store, or by the employees. (swim once received a phone call asking about swim's pipes, asking if they were for "Marijuana" i mean it was over the phone and swim could smell the bacon on the other end!) the task force, as swim has come to understand it in this area with his brushes with the law as a minor, it seems that it operates like a local intelligence agency, they seemed to know the names of every major dealer in the area and they wait for the smaller fish in the sea to slip up; swim was once pressured when he was arrested for marijuana paraphernelia possession (couldve been a lot more than just that) at the age of 14 by local police to assist them in a marijuana sting by purchasing from someone that swim was with at the time. "We want to get him" said the police officer. it seems that they already know what's going on, and from what has happened to swim's friends in the marijuana community, there's even more evidence to support this. Dozens of stories about how the cops were 12 steps ahead of the bigger dealers in the area because of the "nickel and dime" offenders telling all. the particular county swim lives in has one of the most sneaky drug task forces in the United States; at least in a suburban environment

there's tons of stuff to talk about, and no good place to "start" because there is so much... so please i'd be more than willing to make this an open interview for anyone with questions here at DF

[Graduisic]

oh here's probably the only fun part of swim's old job (just to add one positive thing)

there was a six foot bong which customers could try to fill and clear, and if they could they'd get a discount on their purchase. of course, legal herbs such as damiana, nepeta, wormwood, lemon balm, etc. were used. many red faces swim has seen

Reputation Comments on this post:

fun discount! thanks for all the good info in this thread