Howdy folks, new to the forum and feel like an idiot that it never occurred to me to look for one until right now. I have been doing mystery shops for AGES since a buddy of mine showed me how I could actually get paid to buy beer at a gas station in my college days.

I hope that my years of service and host of bizarre experiences in this Mystery Shopper realm will prove to be of service to the forum. But I have to admit, I am a bit territorial and probably won't do much to help you compete directly with me. That is to say, if your question is "how do I get shops in your town?" you can probably do a You Tube search for "cricket sounds" and have a more readily available response. But if I can answer questions about shop scenarios, camera usage, tricks to get snippets of info from your quarry, or feedback about peculiarities of companies I have worked for or any other tricks of the trade please don't hesitate to ask. I also look forward to learning some new tricks myself!

Happy Shopping!

Welcome to the forum.

Welcome MoM! We look forward to getting to know you better and I just love your name!! You will find that most of us here are territorial and don't want anymore competition in our areas so don't feel bad about that at all! I hate when I see a new shopper post who's in my area!! I've been known to post that there is no work here - go away!

Sorry for the delayed response. The only reason I wrote that I was territorial was because I just saw several posts asking about how to find work. Usually I want to help however I can, but I also have to eat.

@Man of Mystery wrote:

Sorry for the delayed response. The only reason I wrote that I was territorial was because I just saw several posts asking about how to find work. Usually I want to help however I can, but I also have to eat.

Where are you located? I wish I had a mystery shopper friend in my area. I know there are plenty because the jobs go pretty fast. It would be cool to swap stories and even help each other out on rotations!

I'm in OKLA-Homa! Where the wind comes sweeping down the plain! Any ideas where to start....

Hi All,
At least for me..I'm not out to compete with anyone..as I'm still working a full time job (for now)..I'm still looking at this mystery shopping thing as a hobby.
David

I'd like to hear about the bizarre experiences.

What part of OK? I have jobs every week in OKC & Tulsa at movie theaters and sometimes in other cities.

Sorry for the delay Cettie, I have been on the road all week. Where do I begin? Taking pictures of a federal building (unknowingly) for a mapping project and getting accosted by federal security- same thing with a bank and with their security(not nearly as exciting). Almost getting into a fight with a very large employee who refused to let me test his credit card reader (I was telling him what he had to do to get a card to work, I wasn't behind the counter and I had an authorization letter) I was on very little sleep and what I was asking him to do was very simple but he refused and I was on road food, very little to no sleep and I uncharacteristically start hulking out on this guy who towered over me, outweighed me by 200lbs and who could have crushed me with his finger and not broken a nail. Or the time I was completing the VERY LAST audit of 300 visits in New York at 10:00 PM- it was an announced visit, it was 2 days before Christmas, I was trying to get home to the deep south, the 24-hour store was locked and I had to coax the manager to the door with my authorization letter with their corporate letterhead and found out they had just been robbed an hour ago (fortunately my slow southern style won them over and I made it home). Or another NY story- this one was in the city and I was at a location and completed my announced visit. It was broad daylight, people all over the place and I am white and the African American manager asked where I was parked. I told him I had managed to get a spot just out front of the store. He looked me up and down with my khaki's and button down shirt and said, "I had better walk you to your car." It never occurred to me that I was in the wrong part of town until that moment.

Interesting, you might possibly have the makings of some Cettie-adventures within. The important thing to know is whether you can out-run a love starved goat?

sounds like sounds like there is a story there?