Sam's Club Prank - Justin's Story
Rob,

Mission Accomplished!

We received the much-anticipated package in the mail a few weeks ago and began to mark the calendar for our escapade. I giggled at the two tags we received in our package.

“Cooper Springs Bottled Vodka in Water Bottles” & “Sweetened Lard”

My son and daughter were natural accomplices for a couple of reasons.

1. My son is named Cooper. I felt the stars had aligned. A bit young for vodka, but not too young to make me look like a normal shopper with a couple of kids.
   
2. My daughter is just old enough to understand the concept, provide cover, and do any dirty work that might have to happen. She was concerned we were going to photograph the prank because it would provide evidence to the cops should we get busted. At age 6, I'm not sure if this is a good sign or a bad sign, but I don't think she will end up on “America's Dumbest Criminals” anytime soon. Fingers crossed.

We packed up the car and I put the fake signs inside my wife's day planner. They fit easily and just looked like I might have a shopping list or something in tote. It was easy to zip up and unzip quickly, without looking odd. This tactic proved successful as opposed to stashing the signs under my shirt or something.

Sam's Club is but a few miles down the road and this Sam's is a new and busy one. We choose to go on a Saturday morning because we figured with all the foot traffic, we were much less likely to be noticed as opposed to going on a less busy day, where a “red vest” might notice us lurking around the aisles. Plus, the idea that more people would actually see the signs provided an added bonus.

My kids and I met up with my wife and brother and sister in law at the Sam's around 11:30am and proceeded to scout the products that matched our signs. I knew Sam's had lots of bottled water, but I wasn't sure they had big packages of lard. I should have known better.

My brother in law and I headed out as the two women hit the panic button and imagined the Sam's police escorting us out the exit with bulk size handcuffs on or something. I felt confident no one would notice. With the signs being magnetic, the switch could be made in a second or less.

First, we found the water in the back corner of the warehouse and immediately ran into a snag. The water was stacked up so deep that to get to the signs, we would have to crawl on top of mounds of water bottles. Quickly, we thought we might need to enlist my daughter to “act out of control” and climb up on the water like we were “those” kind of parents unable to keep our kids from turning Sam's into a playground. But we noticed a better solution. A palette of water on the end of the aisle had a little room for which I could get behind and make the switch. With a quick slap of the new sign and moving the old , “Cooper Springs Vodka in Water Bottles” was in place. Luckily, there was mild traffic in the water section, so we only had to mill around of a few minutes until the coast was clear.

We set out to find a product that would fit the “Sweetened Lard” and came across an aisle that had lots of cooking supplies like spices and flour. Wow, there were lots of people going up and down this aisle. Could there really be this many people in the market for 25lbs of vegetable shortening? No, but there was a sample station set up right in front giving away some kind of juice and the shoppers just kept going down the aisle sipping on their little cups. So we waited and waited. We circled around to another aisle and came back. Then we had an opening. “Are we clear,” I asked my brother in law. “Yea, do it.” So I slapped the sign on in front of huge jugs of cooking shortening and moved the real sign to the back of the railing, so it was out of sight. Success!

After some light shopping, a victory banquet was in order! After seeing my daughter's pizza, I think I understood the “Sweetened Lard” sign a little more.

Here is a picture of us after the caper. I'm sure people walking in thought we were just about as stupid as it gets, taking a picture in front of Sam's like it was Disney Land or something.

Thanks Rob!

 

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