Woman in blackface costume at Bay Area Staples store stuns customers

Harold Leffall, a customer at a Staples store in Pleasant Hill, took this photo of a worker wearing black face paint as part of a Halloween costume. Harold Leffall, a customer at a Staples store in Pleasant Hill, took this photo of a worker wearing black face paint as part of a Halloween costume. Photo: Courtesy Harold Leffall Photo: Courtesy Harold Leffall Image 1 of / 1 Caption Close Woman in blackface costume at Bay Area Staples store stuns customers 1 / 1 Back to Gallery

Customers at a Staples store in Pleasant Hill were upset after seeing a worker's face painted black as part of a Halloween costume.

Harold Leffall of Benicia was in the store Friday to purchase a cash register for his nonprofit. Looking for the item, he approached a woman for help and saw that her face was covered in black paint.

"She turned around and I was so surprised because of her face," Leffall told SFGATE. "It was a white lady with blackface, and it really startled me."

Leffall said that when he first saw her, he thought perhaps it was a setup for a hidden camera show like ABC's "What Would You Do?" which films subjects' reactions in set-up, difficult circumstances.

"To be honest I thought I was on some kind of show," he continued. "I'm like, 'There must be some cameras.'"

COSTUME PROBLEMS: Fox host's attempt at patriotic Halloween costume backfires

Leffall was in disbelief that the woman was on the floor, helping customers at the office supply store. When paying for his item, he told the cashier that he felt the costume was offensive and inappropriate. The cashier agreed and said the woman had explained to her that it was a Sharpie pen costume.

"I said, 'I don't know what that is, but to me, that looks like blackface," Leffall recalled. "'All I see is a white person with blackface. I don't see a Sharpie pen or anything like that.'"

Another customer saw that same worker at Staples and recorded a conversation where she asked about the costume.

Customer Geneen Bland shared the video and told KGO-TV the woman initially joked she was a "Napa fire spa guest" before explaining that she was a "beauty shop customer."

"What is your costume supposed to be?" Bland asked the worker on the video.

"I'm a beauty shop customer," the woman replied, pointing at curlers and a shower cap.

Bland asked why her face was black, and the worker stated it was a "charcoal mask." When Bland then said it looked like blackface, the woman replied, "Oh no no no. That's not me, that's not me."

Defending her decision to wear a black paint on her face, the worker repeated, "It's a charcoal mask. It sits better than the green one I had, because the green starts leaking all over my shirt." Bland pressed on, asking her if she could see why the makeup could be taken as blackface, the woman gestured toward her curlers, saying, "That's why I put (the curlers) up" before ending with, "I apologize if you feel that way."

SCHOOL COSTUME BAN: Schools ditch Halloween costumes, replace it with 'hat day'

Bland complained to store managers, and was also told the woman was wearing a "Sharpie costume," KGO-TV reported. The woman was also reportedly a contract worker from Marketsource, there to promote Hewlett-Packard items, and not a Staples employee.

An earlier statement from Staples to KGO-TV read in part: "A representative from HP who was in one of our stores wore a costume for Halloween that they intended to have represent an office product, but didn't realize it could be considered offensive to some of our customers. While it was unintentional, it was still inappropriate and once this was raised to the representative, they immediately removed the costume."

The store later amended their response to read, "Staples apologizes to any customers that were offended in the store, as well as those that may have viewed a photo of the representative on social media."

Leffall complained to the local store manager at the time and to Staples corporate offices, and called the store's apology, "insufficient."

"I felt it was a very weak apology and it was as if they were putting the responsibility off the fact that she was not an employee of Staples," Leffall said. "For me, she was an affiliate, she was representing the company and she was interfacing with the customers, so to me that was a very insufficient statement and a very weak apology."