The good, the bad, and the ugly from recent shopping expeditions:
byThe Good: The dressing room at Eddie Bauer was adorned with a 2” x 8” recruiting sign. We know that customers are the best source for staffing. While there a million messages on the sales floor to compete with, the customer in the dressing room is definitely a captive audience.
The Bad: While making my purchase the person ringing me up asked me if anyone had helped me. You know what’s worse than an individual commission store? When no one helps you in an individual commission store and someone still gets credit for it. And by the way, the store was an absolute wreck and if I didn’t really want the shirts I would have left.
The Ugly: While waiting for my purchase to be bagged, another employee walked up and started to talk to the cashier. The guy actually quit bagging my purchase to talk to him! I said, “Excuse me. How about you letting him finish helping me before he talks to you?” They gave me the rudest look, the old “what’s your problem buddy?” Uh, my problem is that I want what I paid for so I can leave. And by the way, I wouldn’t want to work here either! As a matter of fact, I doubt I’ll be shopping here again either.
Lesson: Train and develop your staff to focus on the customer, not each other.
The Good: The store associates in Gap Kids were very friendly and engaging.
The Bad: The store manager was doing the schedule at the counter, which was piled high with clothes and looked like hell.
The Ugly: No matter how busy the associates got, the manager never moved beyond the schedule. Go to the backroom, dude! You are adding absolutely no value. Even worse, you’re setting a poor example for your young and impressionable associates.
Lesson: Let’s dig a little deeper for this one. I would guess that Gap has a policy that managers need to be on the floor when the store is open. Obviously the problem was that the manager had more pressing operational issues than working the floor and cleaning off the incredibly cluttered counter. So a policy designed to drive the right behaviors can actually result in the wrong behaviors. Train your managers to doing the right thing at the right time and you won’t need a floor policy for managers.
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The Good: I hit my local Starbucks almost every morning. It’s nice knowing that the minute I walk in the door the guy behind the counter starts to pour my coffee. It’s a delightful experience almost every day.
The Bad: The other day, while I was waiting to pay for my coffee, an employee from another store came in to pick up a box of Frappuccino mix. Instead of completing my sale the partner started to discuss the transfer with her. While I know he should have finished with me before starting a conversation with someone else, I waited patiently.
The Ugly: There wasn’t any.
Lesson: Customers, even cranky, critical ones like me, are forgiving of small slipups when the overall experience is usually a good one and I’m well respected as a customer.
Overall lesson: Do your employees, managers and associates know that above all else their primary focus is the customer? Without the customers, not much else matters.
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