Yes, exactly. The problem (or one of them) with bad epithets is that the author seems to see them as a way to pack in all this information (which either they've not mentioned yet, or they want to make sure they reader is clear on). "The cashier at the front of the Christmas novelty store" is terrible because in this scene, the author should have already established where they are, and once they have, it's no longer necessary to keep reminding the audience. To include all that info in an epithet is clunky and usually turns out to be unnecessary because it's either info that has been stated before or is extranneous.