Elderly Walmart Employee Retires After TikToker Raises $108K In Donations

Sometimes TikTok is more than just a Chinese data mining tool. Sometimes it actually does some good in the world.

Navy veteran Butch Marion retired on Wednesday, thanks to a video that went viral on the social media platform. The 82-year-old Walmart cashier was ringing up items for a customer when that customer began filming him.

The customer was bug extermination business owner Rory McCarty, and his video raked up more than 2 million TikTok views.

Due to the overwhelming support, McCarty set up a GoFundMe to help raise the man's retirement funds.

"As a business owner and knowing how hard it's been to try to find good help for my business, I was astounded seeing this little older man still grinding working 8 to 9 hour shifts," McCarty wrote on the GoFundMe page.

The fundraiser collected $108,682, which was presented to him via a giant check on Wednesday.

"I feel like a new man," Marion said. "This is just unreal."

Marion had a job at General Motors but retired so he could help take care of his ex-wife’s husband. After the husband and the ex-wife died, he went to work at Walmart.

Marion said he will pay off bills, relax at home and use the money to travel to Florida for a three-week trip. There, he'll visit his daughters and grandchildren, whom he hasn’t hugged in years.

McCarty said the act of kindness was inspired by another TikTok user, who raised $133,000 for an elderly Walmart employee working to pay her medical bills.

I'm normally very "get off my lawn" about TikTok, but this is a trend I can get behind.

Written by
Amber is a Midwestern transplant living in Murfreesboro, TN. She spends most of her time taking pictures of her dog, explaining why real-life situations are exactly like "this one time on South Park," and being disappointed by the Tennessee Volunteers.