Applying for a job at Banana Republic...

[TCN]

Originally Posted by marc237

Nope, just a lawyer!

Same difference right?

Cheers, I'm almost two years into my recovery from private practice.

 

[JLibourel]

"Customer Service"? Everybody in this thread, including the OP, seems to think this means retail sales. I always thought "customer service" meant processing returns, handling refunds...that sort of thing. Am I mistaken in this?

 

[Jovan]

You're not, but usually in mall clothing stores they're pretty much the same people.

 

[aybojs]

Having gone through this cycle myself before, retailer managers don't give two ***** about your clothing knowledge if it can't be translated into resume experience in retail. Aside from resume experience, they're only really interested in salesmanship.

 

[TCN]

Originally Posted by JLibourel

"Customer Service"? Everybody in this thread, including the OP, seems to think this means retail sales. I always thought "customer service" meant processing returns, handling refunds...that sort of thing. Am I mistaken in this?

In my humble opinion, when your point of contact people or salespeople can't perform "customer service" duties, that's a problem. While "customer service" may be a desk at Target, "serving customers" should be the focus of a good salesperson . . . again, IMHO.

 

[LabelKing]

Originally Posted by aybojs

Having gone through this cycle myself before, retailer managers don't give two ***** about your clothing knowledge if it can't be translated into resume experience in retail. Aside from resume experience, they're only really interested in salesmanship.
That's the problem with shop help today. They don't know anything nor do they have pride in their product, which can also be said for quality of production as well.

 

[TCN]

Originally Posted by aybojs

Having gone through this cycle myself before, retailer managers don't give two ***** about your clothing knowledge if it can't be translated into resume experience in retail. Aside from resume experience, they're only really interested in salesmanship.

I wonder if that's why non-luxury retail sales have fallen off, and in particular, Gap Inc. has been flat for the last six years.

 

[aybojs]

Originally Posted by TCN

I wonder if that's why non-luxury retail sales have fallen off, and in particular, Gap Inc. has been flat for the last six years.

It's actually much worse in luxury sales, I've found. I applied to a bunch of high end places, impressed the interviewers with how much I knew about their products and the quality of goods, but the people who do the hiring don't really know their product well and only understand resume experience. As I said in a post I made back around when I was trying to get in the clothing business, to your average Neiman's or Sak's HR person, 2-3 years of T-shirt folding experience in the Gap is infinitely more likely to get you hired than demonstrating thorough in-and-out knowledge of the product. I imagine training is not too far from what I did when had a stint at Jos. A Bank; they don't teach the relevant details, they just throw out buzzwords and hope the trainees learn just enough to BS like they know what they're talking about.

 

[Arethusa]

Originally Posted by Jovan

I'd be happy working anywhere with clothing just to get some much needed retail experience.
Ha. Need. So cute. Admittedly, I've worked food service too, and that was worse than my time at Express, but retail is still miserable ****. A friend of mine worked for Banana for a while. All I can say is you need to work it to gain an understanding of just how terrible it is. As for the actual getting hired part, salesmanship and experience are all that matter. No one gives a **** how much you know about clothes. Hell, it's Banana Republic: knowing about clothes is not exactly going to make you enthusiastic.

 

[whoopee]

Originally Posted by LabelKing

That's the problem with shop help today. They don't know anything nor do they have pride in their product, which can also be said for quality of production as well.

The real problem is that the vast majority of people don't care enough to pay any extra or to shop somewhere more than a few steps away from the food court.

 

[aybojs]

Originally Posted by Arethusa

Ha. Need. So cute.

Admittedly, I've worked food service too, and that was worse than my time at Express, but retail is still miserable ****. A friend of mine worked for Banana for a while. All I can say is you need to work it to gain an understanding of just how terrible it is.

What's wrong with food service? I actually just graduated college and am applying only for service industry jobs because I hate white collar office environments so much that I would do anything to avoid them (in other words, not because of any limits on my degree). Sure, there's a lot of idiots working there, but there's just as many in your average office, and you get to meet a lot of interesting people and get a behind the scenes view of places most people take for granted. Retail's a little different, but that's because there's such a wide range of products to sell that it depends on what you're doing, and you don't get the perks of tips. But still, give me customer service over a cubicle any day.

 

[Arethusa]

Higher end food service is different. It's still damn hard work for relatively crappy pay, but it's tolerable, even if I want nothing to do with it if I can help it. If it isn't high end, on the other hand, it just flat out sucks. The work's hard, the pay's worthless, and in most cases, the managers are bastards. Retail is really not very far removed. I'm no fan of living in a cubicle either, but I vastly preferred an internship I did in an office to food service and retail. Aside: if you are even mildly intelligent and more mature than the average high school kid, do not ever work in a salon. That is all.

 

[Jovan]

I imagine training is not too far from what I did when had a stint at Jos. A Bank; they don't teach the relevant details, they just throw out buzzwords and hope the trainees learn just enough to BS like they know what they're talking about.

That's probably why I didn't get hired there...

 

[gusgusterson]

Originally Posted by Jovan

Banana Republic's opening soon here

Gainesville's finally getting a Banana Republic? I left in 1999, I heard there have been some changes. What a market - 40,000ish students with money to spend.

 

[Margaret]

I think that for most shoppers, customer service is far more important than product knowledge. Of course, a customer expects the sales staff to be knowledgeable as far as what what the store offers, but the average BR/Gap/Macy's shopper doesn't particularly care about being educated about clothing while he/she shops. At most, they want to know "does this look good on me?", and I don't even think that's common, at least with male shoppers (unless the salesperson happens to be an attractive female, in which case, it's merely flirtation). It's more important that the sales associate be personable, alert and interested in servicing customers, which is all too rare. And, oh yeah, push those credit cards.