I need to tell you about my experience with a sales associates in Buffalo NY yesterday. I was at the Outlet mall in Niagara at the Levi Strauss store. The associate is named Holly. I want you to know that she has changed my experience with jeans, and has renewed my faith in retail sales associates. As the 3rd generation shop owner in my family, I have been in retail in Toronto my entire life. I pride myself on my customer service, and I instill that in all of my staff. I have rarely been impressed by sales people. In fact I generally avoid them. But Holly was a WEALTH of knowledge, she was enthusiastic about the product and she obviously had a real love for what she was doing. I want you to know this because I was blown away.
All too often I am met with sales people who so obviously dislike what they are doing, or they are simply not engaged. Retail is a hard industry. Hours are long, the pay is generally not very good, and you have to be "On" from the moment you open the doors to the moment you turn off the lights—and even then you get the occasional client who will poke their nose in and ask, "Are you still open?" But programs like Ryerson's Retail Management are hopefully opening new doors to young people so that the retail landscape might just be changing. Retail should not be what you do when you can't do anything else. Like any career, you should find something you love to do, and invest yourself in it fully. A good sales associate should be creative and willing to find solutions to any problem. They must be willing to learn more about the products they sell then anyone else. And they must LIKE PEOPLE.
Based on my experience with Holly yesterday my daughter and I both have agreed that we will happily wear Levi jeans in the future - now that we have jeans that truly fit us! It has re-energized me, and reminded me how much I love what I do here at H. Halpern Esq.