no one is hiring someone solely based upon your experience of working at any of those locations ... Ever.
Nearly every HR (realistically any job that earns over 65k a year) have systems like TheWorkNumber, ADP, Credit Bureaus to get your employment records.
If you done fucked up, they can request tax records and I can guarantee you that all those businesses you listed very much have their tax records available from the IRS.
This idea worked like 10 years ago... Even shitty HR have figured this out by now.
When i got hired last which was 2 years ago (in the US, huge company) they outsourced the checks to a 3rd party and my god were they incompetent. They passed me with a caveat saying they couldn’t confirm my most previous job. The records they turned over to me after show their attempts: 3 phone calls to the main number listed on the company’s website. That’s it. The process dragged on for so long i suspected they were having issues because most everyone i had worked with had been laid off and the company barely existed with likes 15 employees down from 300. They wouldn’t take my offer to connect to the VP and just called the same number until they gave up. Its laughable.
I would imagine it's nowadays at the point where employment verification is automatically fired off to some vetting agency automatically during the process where software does all the cross referencing and anomalies would be caught and reported.
I don't think they have to go all private investigator to get basic employment verification from the actual employers anymore.
Yes and no. Up to 2 years ago my company was still manually requesting criminal background checks. A 3rd party company did them, but HR had to open a case each time. Now that is automatic, but tons of processss at tons of companies are still antiquated for various reasons.
Its entirely possible vetting is minimium because of cost and labor involved.
I disagree. Countless companies won't check this. Sure, Google or Amazon will... But you underestimate the collective incompetence of businesses in the US.
Did you ever see Doogie Howser, M.D.? I'm like that, except for middle management, and a lot younger. Got my MBA when I was still living in my parents.
Director of Internal Audit; Enron Corp. (1998-2001)
Senior Vice President for Risk Management; Lehman Brothers (2002-2008)
Edit: for all the recruiters reaching out, I’m not interested. I’m currently Managing Director for Growth (Europe) at Tesla, and expecting to get a huge bonus after our Q4 2025 sales numbers are final.
Head of QC for O-Ring production, NASA, Jan 1983 - Oct 1986
I think you mean you worked for Morton Thiokol if you were in QC. I know, because I was in rocket component procurement at NASA around the same time, and I remember the contract very well for... reasons....
I worked at a dot com and although I was fairly young at the time I was promoted quickly to management (we had several thousand employees at the time).
When it all came falling down and we were all looking at jobs at the sametime I was being asked by proespective employers "was John Smith really General Manager of customer service"?
The vast majority were customer service monkeys padding the fuck out of their resumes.
That said hate the game not the player. I always nodded and said yes.
Fuck em if they can't do their own verification work.
I'm not an HR professional, by the grace of Jesus, but I believe the proper verification work is stop looking at all my private shit and pay me already.
As someone who was a "store manager" at a franchise with only 2 employees (including myself) this is kinda real. I left in 2012 because even in my early 20s I could see the direction things were going because of corporate mismanagement.
That's why you have to keep it modest at 'regional manager', significant enough to be useful looking, insignificant enough so you can't possibly be to blame for the downfall of the company.
I don't really have much memory of this, but I apparently started using keyboards when I was two. I only know because of things my father told me and one personal memory.
Eventually I I joined a company which encouraged me to record my skills with my history. I was nineteen at the time. They certainly were aware of that.
I recorded in their system that I had been using keyboards for seventeen years. They didn't appreciate it. I think I might have taken their request too literally.
I was a manager at a RadioShack. And it was a franchise, so it’s even less verifiable (I think). Not a regional manager though. Oh, I mean, I was a district manager.
RadioShack is still around. Not sure how good it is.
Interestingly, it started as a mail order business in the 1920s, switched to retail stores in the 1960s, and then in 2017 it switched back to an online only / mail delivery business.
My father actually ran a few when I was little years later we found a box of promotion razor blades in the garage with the circuit city logo on them, along with an apropos tagline “like nowhere else.”
That's because the cost of those batteries was like <$2 and sold for like 14-18 dollars. It was nuts seeing the cost of some things when it came time to get the employee discount
Sears blew it so bad. They were essentially Amazon before Amazon, with that huge catalogue. All they had to do was put that catalogue online, and they could have easily been first to market.
Instead, they had a board of old coots with that old "I don't even know how to turn ON a computer" attitude that was common in the 90s among old farts. They thought that was some kind of brag. I heard it in my old company, too. Those fucking arrogant losers sat in their boardroom congratulating themselves, as the Internet steadily ate their market share to nothing.
I mean the mismanagement didn't help at all. Forcing different departments to compete with each other, some departments spinning up redundant support teams that were exclusive to their department, etc.
With halfway decent management Sears was in a good position to continue holding a massive and controlling portion of the American household market, the problem is they had inept owners managing the company who managed to snatch bankruptcy from the jaws of success
It doesn't help that it was owned by a hedge fund that made bank on Sears' demise such as by saddling Sears with a ton of debt, 40% of which was owned by Sears' parent company
Oh, I hadn't realized that Sears was one of those companies that got broken up and sold off, like Toys R Us. That always sucks.
The difference is that Sears wasn't offering anything that you couldn't buy from anywhere else, and was struggling against competition in the best of times, while Toys R Us pretty much owned the market, and was doing well when they were murdered as a company. Sears kind of deserved their fate, Toys R Us did not.
Also, it's amazing that Penny's, Sears' primary competition, is still around and doing pretty well, or surviving at least, mostly because they made the jump to online sales in time.
It wasn't exactly the same. The guy who bought them was mostly interested in pillaging the real estate, which he sold to himself at a huge discount. He then decided to show off the superiority of his randian philosophy by enacting policies that very quickly destroyed what was left.
no one is hiring someone solely based upon your experience of working at any of those locations ... Ever.
Nearly every HR (realistically any job that earns over 65k a year) have systems like TheWorkNumber, ADP, Credit Bureaus to get your employment records.
If you done fucked up, they can request tax records and I can guarantee you that all those businesses you listed very much have their tax records available from the IRS.
This idea worked like 10 years ago... Even shitty HR have figured this out by now.
WTF that's way to much insights in data that shouldn't be collected in first place.
And guess what! For $8 you can access all that data for anyone you want!
Fuck us plebs amirite?
When i got hired last which was 2 years ago (in the US, huge company) they outsourced the checks to a 3rd party and my god were they incompetent. They passed me with a caveat saying they couldn’t confirm my most previous job. The records they turned over to me after show their attempts: 3 phone calls to the main number listed on the company’s website. That’s it. The process dragged on for so long i suspected they were having issues because most everyone i had worked with had been laid off and the company barely existed with likes 15 employees down from 300. They wouldn’t take my offer to connect to the VP and just called the same number until they gave up. Its laughable.
I mean, no one is hiring me one way or the other, but with that method I can look at my CV and feel I accomplished something. So, that's good.
I would imagine it's nowadays at the point where employment verification is automatically fired off to some vetting agency automatically during the process where software does all the cross referencing and anomalies would be caught and reported.
I don't think they have to go all private investigator to get basic employment verification from the actual employers anymore.
Yes and no. Up to 2 years ago my company was still manually requesting criminal background checks. A 3rd party company did them, but HR had to open a case each time. Now that is automatic, but tons of processss at tons of companies are still antiquated for various reasons.
Its entirely possible vetting is minimium because of cost and labor involved.
I disagree. Countless companies won't check this. Sure, Google or Amazon will... But you underestimate the collective incompetence of businesses in the US.
Ah, but what if you live in a non English speaking country?
Me: I was a regional manager of Toys R Us between 1995 and 2008.
Interviewer: It says here on your resume you were born in 1999, and you moved to Australia in 201x.
Me: ummmmm
Refer them to the documentary boss baby if your early employment history is ever brought into question
"They made a lot of strange decisions before they shut down"
"Toys R Us invested heavily in both time and inter-dimensional travel. As a result I've lived a thousand lives in service of the giraffe."
I like the cut of your jib. You're hired!
Did you ever see Doogie Howser, M.D.? I'm like that, except for middle management, and a lot younger. Got my MBA when I was still living in my parents.
Exactly, and you wonder why the failed... hiring a 18yo as a regional manger.
no wait, that doesn't look good...
That’s why my CV looks so strong:
Director of Internal Audit; Enron Corp. (1998-2001)
Senior Vice President for Risk Management; Lehman Brothers (2002-2008)
Edit: for all the recruiters reaching out, I’m not interested. I’m currently Managing Director for Growth (Europe) at Tesla, and expecting to get a huge bonus after our Q4 2025 sales numbers are final.
Head of security, Wold Trade Centre, NY, 1995-2001.
I think you mean you worked for Morton Thiokol if you were in QC. I know, because I was in rocket component procurement at NASA around the same time, and I remember the contract very well for... reasons....
I see from your resume that you're good at looking the other way while we make billions. You're hired.
PLEASE
Didn't you also help found that FTX crypto exchange a few years ago too?
I was the lead engineer behind the graphite tips rods at Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant and I helped Boeing design MCAS for the 737 max
I just now realized: someone has the most cursed resume on LinkedIn. I'd expect something in line with this.
I see you left that short stint at WorldCom off your resume.
Weren’t you also the Lead Safety Engineer at OceanGate for a while?
No, that was at Boeing.
I worked at a dot com and although I was fairly young at the time I was promoted quickly to management (we had several thousand employees at the time).
When it all came falling down and we were all looking at jobs at the sametime I was being asked by proespective employers "was John Smith really General Manager of customer service"?
The vast majority were customer service monkeys padding the fuck out of their resumes.
That said hate the game not the player. I always nodded and said yes.
Fuck em if they can't do their own verification work.
inadvertently kickstarts Elizabeth Holmes promotion to CEO a job or two later :p j/k
btw curious what the proper verification work is. Thought calls were standard. Maybe pulling tax records if possible?
I'm not an HR professional, by the grace of Jesus, but I believe the proper verification work is stop looking at all my private shit and pay me already.
“I tried to save them but… they didn’t listen”
As someone who was a "store manager" at a franchise with only 2 employees (including myself) this is kinda real. I left in 2012 because even in my early 20s I could see the direction things were going because of corporate mismanagement.
Well hey, if it isn't Mr. Manager of the banana stand
That's why you have to keep it modest at 'regional manager', significant enough to be useful looking, insignificant enough so you can't possibly be to blame for the downfall of the company.
Well I read the art of the deal, I'm as baffled as you.
Only if you're fucking old.
"It says here you were a general manager at Radioshack?"
"Correct"
"They went bankrupt in 2015, which would make you.... 11, at the time?"
"I started young"
I was thinking this too, but they do ask for 10 years of experience on entry level positions so HR gets a taste of their own medicine here
I don't really have much memory of this, but I apparently started using keyboards when I was two. I only know because of things my father told me and one personal memory.
Eventually I I joined a company which encouraged me to record my skills with my history. I was nineteen at the time. They certainly were aware of that.
I recorded in their system that I had been using keyboards for seventeen years. They didn't appreciate it. I think I might have taken their request too literally.
Lmao you'll change your mind so hard in just a few more years
In a few more years, it'll be "only if you're fucking dead".
Use a newer company, say you worked at Theranos or FTX.
I resemble that comment!
I was a manager at a RadioShack. And it was a franchise, so it’s even less verifiable (I think). Not a regional manager though. Oh, I mean, I was a district manager.
RadioShack still has open franchises
Frys electronics is a good bet too they're a more recent shutdown that might be more relevant than a blockbuster or toys r us
Yeah Frys folk were a super weird set though so that might not work as you think
RadioShack is still around. Not sure how good it is.
Interestingly, it started as a mail order business in the 1920s, switched to retail stores in the 1960s, and then in 2017 it switched back to an online only / mail delivery business.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RadioShack
There's still a handful of franchises which retained the naming rights post-bankruptcy too!
Toys R Us too! In Canada at least
Toys R us s still exists though
The brand exists, but it's not the same company.
I went to a Radio Shack a few years back. They still exist as well
Funny enough I saw one at my local mall the other day. Had to do a double take cause the giraffe plushies they had looked familiar
The Social Security Administration certainly can.
But what employer is going to deal with verifying that
Used to be as easy as logging in and typing in the SSN. But that was several years ago, so idk about now.
Okay, fine, but besides them...
I ran Circuit City. All of them.
My father actually ran a few when I was little years later we found a box of promotion razor blades in the garage with the circuit city logo on them, along with an apropos tagline “like nowhere else.”
Didn't expect to be jump scared by the abandoned Staten Island shoprite that was used as a set for the fallout TV show on here
Was Radio Shack as cool as Tandy stores in Europe?
What is a Tandy store?
It was heaven for teenage nerds. Transistors resistirs wires soldering irons weeeeh and all in a paper catalogue to read for hours
Sounds like Radio Shack in the before times, that is until their primary focus became cell phones and dvd players.
And batteries. They really wanted to sell you those batteries.
That's because the cost of those batteries was like <$2 and sold for like 14-18 dollars. It was nuts seeing the cost of some things when it came time to get the employee discount
Pretty sure they must be related, considering yes radio shack sold that stuff as well, and they sold Tandy computers
RadioShack is a subsidiary of Tandy. It was not created by Tandy, but bought in the 60s.
Fun fact: Tandy started as a leather company waaay back.
And Tandy Leather still exists! It's in better shape than Tandy Electronics (which is called RadioShack now, the bought ate the buyer).
There's a lesson here. Technology comes and passes, other things stay.
This is a great idea till the interviewer hits you with the "oh cool, my freind Jhonny was also a regional manager there, where were you the RM?"
There were no regional managers named Jhonny. Your friend is a liar and you should cut them out of your life.
North Kilt Town.
I'm from North kilt town!
Yes I was most important manager at Circuit City which closed because the covid and I haven't worked since. Job please.
Or Sears
Sears blew it so bad. They were essentially Amazon before Amazon, with that huge catalogue. All they had to do was put that catalogue online, and they could have easily been first to market.
Instead, they had a board of old coots with that old "I don't even know how to turn ON a computer" attitude that was common in the 90s among old farts. They thought that was some kind of brag. I heard it in my old company, too. Those fucking arrogant losers sat in their boardroom congratulating themselves, as the Internet steadily ate their market share to nothing.
I mean the mismanagement didn't help at all. Forcing different departments to compete with each other, some departments spinning up redundant support teams that were exclusive to their department, etc.
I don't know about all that, but it sounds like another problem with the top management again.
It seems like they had an attitude that Sears has always existed, and will always exist. It can't be killed.
Yes, it can.
With halfway decent management Sears was in a good position to continue holding a massive and controlling portion of the American household market, the problem is they had inept owners managing the company who managed to snatch bankruptcy from the jaws of success
It doesn't help that it was owned by a hedge fund that made bank on Sears' demise such as by saddling Sears with a ton of debt, 40% of which was owned by Sears' parent company
Oh, I hadn't realized that Sears was one of those companies that got broken up and sold off, like Toys R Us. That always sucks.
The difference is that Sears wasn't offering anything that you couldn't buy from anywhere else, and was struggling against competition in the best of times, while Toys R Us pretty much owned the market, and was doing well when they were murdered as a company. Sears kind of deserved their fate, Toys R Us did not.
Also, it's amazing that Penny's, Sears' primary competition, is still around and doing pretty well, or surviving at least, mostly because they made the jump to online sales in time.
It wasn't exactly the same. The guy who bought them was mostly interested in pillaging the real estate, which he sold to himself at a huge discount. He then decided to show off the superiority of his randian philosophy by enacting policies that very quickly destroyed what was left.
I just went to a JCPenney closing sale the other day while I'm living near a Sears that's still open haha
I thought all the Sears stores were closed.
Five Sears still exist in
Braintree, MA Coral Gables, FL Concord, CA El Paso, TX Orlando, FL
Does toys r us not exist anymore?
Imagine this guy just woke up from a 30 year nap in a cryotube in a desert wasteland
Boy do I have some bad news for you
Nah, it's fine. We have TikTok.
I've been to a toys r us in the last 30 years 🤔
Wonder when they closed then. I don't actually spend that much time in the united states.
Drove by one this morning so they probably just pulled out of a region or something.
The name got bought, and somebody else reopened some. Mostly just a section within Macy's, but there's a handful of actual stores.
Except Canada, apparently. That's the only original Toys R Us left.
https://www.cp24.com/news/canada/2026/02/03/toys-r-us-canada-files-for-creditor-protection/
I saw it in Canada so that makes sense.
Sorta.
https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/TOYRF/
The only thing yahoo is good for these days.
So last year? That's not too long ago and here I am being called old by others…
I haven’t seen one in SoCal in a decade or so
Just go to any Macy's and you'll find them
You cant prove i didnt own all of em: think the smrartest
Uhhhhh, that just means you're a terrible businessman, who ran a long standing major chain into the ground.
Well at least that qualifies you for a CEO job
yeah, but you can't prove i DIDN'T do that
2424 Hylan Blvd, Staten Island, NY 10306
Went shopping at Toys R Us and Sears back in December 2025/January 2026 respectively
doubt
I can literally send you dated receipts, although I'd need to remove all sensitive info first haha
I's just foolin'.
Really a great pro life tip, this one
There is a toys r us in Tennessee again.