by Dana Branham, editor-in-chief

The Roar talked to junior Emanuel Quiros, who works in the school store called The Tiger Cage. Quiros shared stories about how the store runs, and some troubles the staff has run into along the way.

How long have you been working in the store?

We’ve been working since July, having meetings, getting everything ready for the store to open. I’ve worked in here every day since school’s started.

What are some of the things that people come in to buy?

Coffee, t-shirts, mainly anything that’s school memorabilia–those are the most commonly bought items.

Is working in the store fun? What are you guys learning?

It’s pretty fun. Basically, we’re learning how to run a business. Each of us is a manager of a different department, so we have merchandise managers, general manager, operations manager–we all take different parts of the business and we try to specialize in those areas.

What is interesting about what you do?

We get to decide what products are brought in,  and we like to poll people around the school to see what products they’d like to see, because it’s meant to be the students’ store. We want to try to provide whatever they want. The problem is, when we started, the school district bought a bunch of school supplies and that hasn’t been a big seller. We’re starting to get more school memorabilia and stuff that students actually want. And all the money we get goes straight back to student activity funds.

Do you have any crazy stories about what’s happened while you’ve been working at the store?

On opening day, we were giving out free refreshments to teachers, and what happened was one of the cash handlers–basically, one of the accountants of the store–they accidentally threw a chunk of ice into the cooler and it punctured one of the cans and it exploded everywhere.

The Tiger Cage is located inside the cafeteria, and is open during fourth period. Check out their Facebook page for updates on new products.