The Retail Nightmares

France's commercial spaces, from hypermarkets to shopping centers, generate their own mythology.

The Carrefour Curse

Several Carrefour hypermarkets built on historically significant sites report: - Products rearranging overnight into meaningful patterns - Security footage showing figures in period dress - Cash registers displaying prices in francs - Most persistently, certain aisles where electronics malfunction

The Carrefour in Villeneuve-la-Garenne, built on a medieval cemetery: - Customers find products they didn't select in carts - Children speak to "friends" in toy aisles others can't see - Most unsettling, the refrigerated section where breath fogs regardless of temperature

Staff maintain unofficial protocols: - Never work alone after midnight - Certain aisles require paired patrols - Most importantly, respect the "offerings"—products that must remain untouched

IKEA: The Infinite Store

The IKEA phenomenon transcends international boundaries but takes unique form in France: - Customers report stores larger inside than outside - Showrooms that don't appear on maps - Most commonly, the inability to find exits despite clear signage

The Lille IKEA incident of 2018: - A family reported missing for six hours - Security footage showed them throughout the store - They claimed days passed inside - Most bizarre, they aged noticeably in hours

French IKEAs now post warnings: - "Follow the arrows strictly" - "Do not deviate from marked paths" - Most telling, emergency buttons in sections maps claim don't exist