If you are getting results through your own efforts, the company pays you very well for that. I like that. I like knowing that I am getting paid for what I do, not for what somebody else does.
Retailing is an excellent management background. I am managing eight people right now, and that is pretty good if you are only twenty-three years old. It is a great background if you are going to go into other fields.
If I want to make a change that's going to cost more money than I have allotted to me, I have to present the plan, plead my case, and hopefully get it accepted. Sometimes I get that acceptance and sometimes I don't. Sometimes I am told that we're going to do it but we can't do it right now. Sometimes I'm told that it's just not right to do it at all. That's all part of the fun.
I love the variety, the flexibility, and the constant pressure. I thrive on pressure and challenge. There's a constant challenge to do better, to beat yesterday, to beat last year.
It's a position where I can see changes. It's tangible. I can try one kind of approach to something. If that doesn't work, then I try something else that works very, very well. I know that I did it. I can actually drive a business to success!
Question - What are some of the negative aspects of your job?
Answer - There are some irritating points, for example, when there is a major deadline to meet or when you're setting up a sale and the merchandise arrives late. Those are irritations, but there's nothing about the job I don't like.
Probably frustration. Not being able to do everything I want to do as quickly as I want to do it.
Whenever you're dealing with somebody else's money and whenever you're working for somebody else, you're dealing with their money. So there are going to be restrictions that you don't particularly care for, or frustrations that you can't solve individually. But I really don't think that I'd still be in retailing if I didn't enjoy every aspect of it.
Question - What types of skills are important in retailing?
Answer - We're looking for people who have a fair amount of aggressiveness and a lot of self-assurance, who can think logically and are fast on their feet.
In this business you can't let anything slide. You have to be very aggressive, you have to be on top of everything that affects your business. And everything affects your business. If you feel that you need additional resources, you must speak. You have to be assertive. I'm not a shy person, and I think that too many things would go by me if I were.
Management skill and merchandising skill. Within the management skill I think you have to have people skills, organizational skills, and certain standards that aren't necessarily skills, for example, standards in taste, fashion, and presentation. For merchandising, an individual has to be assertive rather than aggressive and have some degree of analytical skill. Now, there's one other ingredient that everybody has to have and that is a genuine desire to succeed.
You've got to be in touch with the customers, because the customers are going to tell you daily what they like and what they don't like.
I think that one of the major skills is certainly the ability to work with people in a very positive direction. As being the director of almost 200 people out here on a given day, I have to be able to stand back and make decisions based on rational thought rather than emotional stance.
Question - Are there differences between buying and store management?
Answer - When you are in management of a store, you are greatly associated with merchandising but not in the same sense as a merchandise manager, because merchandise managers take the risk for the things they buy. The store manager's responsibility is to organize, project, and sell the merchandise.
The difference between merchandising and management is that one deals with buying and selling the merchandise, the other deals with supporting the sale and buying of the merchandise. The management segment, the personnel department, the control (accounting) division, the physical division, and the advertising division are all operating segments that support the buying and selling of the merchandise section. The merchandising segment consists of the buyers, the assistant buyers, the divisional merchandise managers, and the general merchandise managers, all of those people who are actively involved in buying and selling merchandise. The merchants are the people who actually go to the market, purchase products, plan purchases, carry out the plans to purchase the products, and get them sold.
Question - Do you have any advice for someone interested in retailing?
Answer - I would get as much practical experience as possible, so that you really know it's what you want to do. Working at the salesperson level is experience that is necessary.
I don't think that there is any replacement in the entire retailing business for learning every step. I'm not particularly in a big hurry to get to be president of the store. I've got to work on my own to make sure that I don't get stale and stagnant and to try new approaches to the business.
The retailing rewards really come in greater numbers and in greater depth with every year that you spend at it. The first year is the least rewarding, and it gets better thereafter. And so does the money.
A lot of times people get into this business because of the glamour that appears to be on the outside-all the trips to the market, to Europe, to South America. A lot of times the retailer has the image of being a fashionable dresser, living a very glamorous life style. I can be all of that, and there are portions that are exactly that. Market trips are very exciting, in a lot of ways they really broaden your horizons in travel if you can get into a particularly good buying job that presents the opportunity to travel abroad. Not all jobs do that. I see the disenchantment of many entrants into this business after a couple months; they find that it's sweat, it's hard work, and it's long hours. You have to find gratification in the challenges.
