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‘People are poor’: Target worker shows how many people swap out their old shoes for new ones in shoe department

‘My and my family had class back in the day and would do this at Kohl’s.’

Photo of Nina Hernandez

Nina Hernandez

Trash bin filled with shoes and text that says 'rate the shoes people swapped out and left for me today'(l), Target worker posing with phone(c), Target sign(r)

A Target worker makes a game out of rating the old shoes people swap out for new ones in the shoe department. The number might surprise you.

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TikTok user Light Magician Girl (@lightmagiciangirl) posted the video on Saturday from her job at Target. One of her duties is apparently to track down and dispose of the old shoes people swapped out for new ones in the shoe department.

This isn’t exactly glamorous work, but Light Magician Girl (LMG) doesn’t let it phase her. In fact, she turns the exercise into something of a game show. And on that game show, she rates the quality of the offerings (nonpaying) customers left behind. “Rate the shoes people swapped out and left for me today,” she writes in the on-screen caption.

How she rates the old shoes

Cue “What Dreams Are Made Of” by Hillary Duff.

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The first shoes are a pair of black flip-flops that someone clearly wore for a while before deciding to discard. “5/10,” Light Magician Girl writes. “Not horrible. Footprint really tied it together.”

Behind those is a pair of well-worn sneakers. “10/10,” writes LMG. “Hope you got away with some nice ones. You needed them, girly.”

Next up is a black pair of plastic clogs. The bottoms are worn down after what looks like miles and miles of use. “0/10,” says LMG. “Disgusting. Really hated all the circles. I’m glad you left them behind.”

Sadly, the last contestant is a single black sandal with a stain on the strap. LMG’s rating? “2/10. Only found one. Is she coming back to leave me the other one today?” 

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@lightmagiciangirl what do you guys think :D #fyp #workingattarget #target #targetjobs #shoes #funny #viral #targetstore #targetfinds @target ♬ What Dreams Are Made Of – Hilary Duff

Viewers react to the rating system

The video has amassed more than 712,000 views as of this writing. In the comments section, viewers weighed in on this practice and the reasons someone might steal shoes.

“When I was a kid, we would do this right before the new school year,” wrote one viewer. “It was the only way we were getting new shoes because my mom couldn’t afford it.”

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“My and my family had class back in the day and would do this at Kohl’s,” wrote another viewer.

Someone else said, “I work at a shoe store and I would be so fine with it if people did this. Get your bag. We all need good shoes. I just hate finding them unexpectedly in a box.”

This isn’t exactly a new method of theft. A Reddit user posted about finding a pair of random shoes a couple of years ago. In the comments, users told all kinds of stories about finding abandoned shoes while shoe shopping.

The Daily Dot reached out to Light Magician Girl via TikTok comment and direct message. It also reached out to Target via press email.

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