Your employees gave you a gift by acknowledging they had “survivor’s guilt.” But the heart of the problem is how they feel like a sham selling at retail. Clerking is what they are comfortable with because their self-image doesnt’ allow them to put themselves out there to risk rejection.
Sales were dropping off and the Arrow CEO saw that the trend was changing to a complete shirt. He announced to his board of directors in 1930, “We will never get there doing what we’re doing now.” That’s when something truly remarkable happened.
Without mentors to help teach this concept and mirror it, we end up with my swimming buddies questioning why they have to do something. The assumptions they make translate into thinking the minimum is what customers want. It isn’t and employees like this can kill a business.
In preparation for a speech, I spent a lot of time studying toy stores; how they look, how they display, where they’re located. One thing that sticks out though is how so many load their stores with merchandise that they love then stack it altogether, gobs of individual products face out, just like the big [...]
An article in today’s Wall Street Journal titled, Restaurants Burned by Deep Discounts, said in part, “as several chains prepare to report second quarter earnings in coming weeks, Wall Street is bracing for news that price cuts not only ate into profits but failed to bring in as many customers as hoped. There was an 8% [...]
With many malls losing customers and major players, now is the time to pursue rent reductions from your landlord. The legal jargon “cotenancy clauses”, are common in retail leases, they let tenants demand cuts in rent — or even a penalty-free pullout if key tenants or a specified numbers of stores leave the center.
What’s wrong with old-fashioned selling? It’s pushy, it’s aggressive, it sizes you up immediately either into a sucker or a tire-kicker. The salesperson needs you more than you need the sales person. The trouble is everyone hates it. You hear it when they reference used-car salesman, say “He could sell ice to Eskimos,” or compare them [...]
“I get it,” is short-hand that discounts the need for further explanation as in a friend talking to another friend about being dumped, “I get it, you’re bitter, go on.” How often do you hear that in a film, on the TV or say it to your friends? I’ll bet a lot. I have created some [...]
This problem extends into management when we don’t write people up for being late, rudeness or their inability to perform the job. Thinking like an employee cripples managers from doing their job as a merchant. We want to be “nice,” “liked,” “popular.” I had a boss one time say, “You’re only as good as your last sale.” Brutal. He was a merchant.
