When I was young I used to think that WHSmith was all one word, and was thus pronounced "Wwwhhhhuuusmith"

Nathan

For a few years in early childhood, I thought that all places that played Muzak had a full orchestra above the ceiling. I imagined them all sitting up there playing their instruments, tucked out of sight.

T

My parents used to take me to the mall a lot when I was a kid. The mall used to look a lot bigger on the inside than it did from the outside (at least it did to my 4-year-old eyes). My dad told me this was due to the fact that a man who worked for the mall would punch a button to shrink the building down at the end of the day. I believed him. So whenever I would whine about not wanting to leave the mall, my dad would tell me that we only had 5 minutes before "the man" pushed the button, so we had better get out of the mall quickly before it shrank and trapped us inside.

Tom

In the parking lot of the shopping mall once, my mother and I were talking and my younger sisters (aged 2 and 3 at the time) were in the backseat complaining loudly that they wanted to leave. So my mother told them that if they didn't behave those people coming out of the mall, the *mall people* were going to come and take them away.

It became very easy from that point on to discipline my little sisses. We would just tell them, "Don't make me call the mall people!" This did, however, cause them to be afraid of shopping malls for many years.

Stephanie

My mom told my little brother that we were going to the antique shop(he is only 6) and he looked confused but said ok anyway. when we got the he ran up to the lady and hugged her and yelled imso happy to see you Aunt Tik. We died laughing and had to explain it to him

Cassie

When I was a kid, typical grocery stores in my town had slanted mirrors in places, like behind the produce bins. For a long time, I didn't realize that they were mirrors. I thought they were windows allowing a view into a different part of the store, a part that wasn't level but steeply slanted. It seemed almost a magical part of the store. Shoppers there seemed to effortlessly walk up the steep floor with no danger of sliding down. And they could leave their shopping carts in place without them rolling downhill. I figured that it was only a matter of time until my parents would have occasion to shop in that other strange and wonderful part of the store, and they would take me there with them. Eventually I was very disappointed to learn that no such thing would ever happen.

Bobby

This isn't my belief, but something a friend of mine heard a small girl say as she was exiting a store.
In New Zealand, there's a store called "The Warehouse." In the commercials, it always says "The Warehouse -- Where everyone gets a bargain!"
This girl was only about three or so, and so she didn't know what a "bargain" was, only that everyone who went to the store got one. Apparently, she was heard crying and wailing upon leaving the store about how she "didn't get her bargain!"

Alison Sha

When I was around 6 years old, I lost my knitted winter cap in a department store while I was there with my Mother. Two weeks later, we came back to the store, and the escalator was all taken apart. My mom told me not to ask anyone if they had seen my cap because it had been pulled down into the escalator and gotten caught and we'd have to pay for the escalator repairs. I guess I had more presence of mind at the time because I didn't believe it but I thought SHE did.

ELLEN

When we were about to park in some mall's parking lot, my mom looked around at all the cars and said "it's gonna be a zoo!" (as in, the place is gonna be packed). When I went in with her and looked around, I asked her where the animals were. XP

Someone You Probably Don't Know ^_^

I used to believe that the Pillsbury doughboy actually lived in the refrigerated shelves in the grocery store. I always secretly looked for him when we went grocery shopping just hoping to be able to push his belly.

Natalie

Until recently, I believed that the food on the shelves was the only food that the stores had. Since I was told many times about the ill effects of smoking, I often wondered, "Why don't we just buy all the cigarettes? Then there won't be any left!"

Silly_Chiquita

when i was little i heard about nike putting people to work in sweatshops, so i figured that to make sure they had enough people in the sweatshops they took whoever owned thier shoes.so whenever my mom took me to buy shoes i would reminder her profusly NOT to buy nike.

girl in blue

Whenever I'd ask for something when my mom and I were shopping, she'd tell me we couldn't buy it because she didn't have a coupon or it wasn't on sale. I used to think that you LITERALLY weren't allowed to buy it without a coupon/sale, and it was only for display until it actually went on sale. I never threw a tantrum about not getting what I wanted because I thought the store wouldn't let us buy it.

Anon

I used to believe that the overhead-pages on the loudspeaker in supermarkets was from lost children looking for their parents.

Jackie F

I used to ask my mother why she would complain about spending money at the grocery store. At the end the cashier would hand my mother some coins. So, I reasoned, if you were getting more coins back than the bills you gave, then you were MAKING money, not spending it.

Jayme

i used to think adoption was done by visiting the baby store, and picking out the one you wanted. i can still remember my vague versions of a store lined with babies.
kind of like a pet store i guess.
i had a wild imagination.

Donielle.

I used to believe that price tags in stores were what the store paid to get them from the manufacturer; they paid their employees from the sales tax

blake

As a child, a place like the grocery store can seem enormous! I grew up in the 60's-70's. During that time there were a lot of colorful and unique characters regularly used as spokespersons in comercials for products. You probably recognize many of these: Madge (Palmolive dishwashing liquid "You're soaking in it."), Mr. Whipple ("Don't squeeze the Charmin!"), Jolly Green Giant (Ho Ho Ho!", Mr. Bubble, Kool-Aid Pitcher, Honey Bear (Golden Sugar Crisp cereal)...and lots more...There were hundreds of them! And I believed that somehow they magically resided somewhere in the grocery store. So, for that reason, I really didn't mind going shopping with my mom. Well, that and I could help pick-out the snacks!

Rich G.

When I was younger my mother used to go to a butcher shop to get her meats. I believed that they killed the cows right there in the back rooms and I was always trying to get a peek into the back hallway.

k.e.

I always thought that a strip mall was a mall you had to strip to get into. For some reason my mom couldn't ever get me to go to one......

~Erin