This past weekend I was doing some shopping, and the salespeople were terrible! They hardly knew what the sales were or how to explain them, they weren’t available for a dressing room, they didn’t help with sizes or colors, and were generally not helpful or pleasant. This may be an extreme case, because I have had some incredible retail sales experiences, but it made me wonder what the “perfect” retail sales person does? How does management train them? Because at a certain point, the individual could be the worst human on earth, but if I like a skirt I will absolutely still purchase it, and I think that goes for most people. And if they don’t jump to take my choices to a dressing room, I will still go to one because I like the clothes. And if they don’t know the sales, I’ll just ring it up and see what happens if I love the outfit enough. That said, do retail salespeople really sell anything? Or do they just make sure the store isn’t stolen from and ring shoppers out?
So what is the balance of the perfect salesperson walking around your favorite store? I prefer when they really become your friend, and help you choose what looks good on, fetches different sizes, and pairs items you’ve selected with something in the store that would look great with it. Not everyone likes that, however. So what is their “real” job? I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments!
BoweryJE22
From a person who works in the retail sales space, and to answer your question: yes, we do sell. It may not be your traditional sales position, but we do sell. I currently work at Bath and Body Works, and worked retail clothing at Deb before it went out of business. Selling scents and selling clothes, shoes, and accessories are vastly different but do have their similarities.
A retail sales person is typically known as a “sales associate”, and the position is just as straight forward as the title. Although the signs telling you the deals are enough to sell in itself, we are essentially an extensions of the posters you see. We are supposed know the deals in the store, know coupons, know prices of individual items, and help you when necessary. Our sole priority is to make sure that our customer is taken care of.
There are direct and indirect methods of selling in the retail space also. For someone like you who wanted opinions on the things that you were buying, wanted a dressing room, and different sizes for you to try on, that would be more direct selling. You’re interacting with the customer at higher levels than someone who would be selling indirect. Indirect in the retail space would be someone who walked in the store with the intent of “looking around”. Basically with that sort of customer you would let them know the deals going on in the store, let them go on their merry way, and check up on them when necessary. If this customer would come to you needing help, that would be a segue into a direct retail selling engagement.
Retail sales is most definitely different than your traditional sales role, but follows very similar principles like the ones mentioned in this class. It’s different in the way that it sells, but that is also because of the nature of retail. There are a lot of things that go into retail sales that not many people know, and at times can be a fairly exhausting job.
I feel awful that you had a bad retail experience! 🙁 But on the flip side, I hope that I answered your question! 🙂
Hoping for a better experience next time & happy shopping! 🙂
I can definitely relate to some of your experiences. Even if you don’t have sales in your job description you are still expected to sell! For example: Professor Sweet sells all the time!