PR AND RETAIL LOCATIONS
I (foolishly) spent the day shopping during this major holiday weekend – admittedly at high-end, brand-name stores, and primarily at those establishments that spend a ton of money in advertising in an attempt to draw customers to the stores’ various locations.
Earlier in the week, at a major sporting event, I had a similar thought: Why do brands spend so much money trying to draw people to their stores and then so little time and attention once they have people there? At this event, a 5W client and I stood on line for perhaps 15 minutes attempting to buy food and drink — products that cost more than the employee serving the food makes in an hour — and as the line grew to about 10 people, many simply walked away due to the long wait and the employees’ lack of attention to the customers. Why wouldn’t the brand ensure that the site has enough low-wage employees working rather than turn off its patrons?
Although a lot of noise was made some months ago regarding Starbucks training employees and closing all locations for a few hours, after today’s experience, I came to the conclusion that many of America’s retail outlets could use similar training. From a store manager who loudly said to an employee, “Don’t bother answering that question - it’s dumb,” in response to a customer’s question, to stores that allow people to wander endlessly without its employees simply asking, “Can I help you?” one wonders, why spend millions on advertising? Perhaps the money is better spent retraining employees.
True, it’s tremendously difficult for anyone to manage employees — particularly employees in retail who aren’t well-paid — but I can’t help but believe that many people echo my opinion that stores need to focus much more attention on this arena. Without well-trained employees who reflect positively on the establishments they represent, store operators might as well say, “Take my customers, please.” That’s surely PR too.
Ronn Torossian
5WPR
September 4th, 2008 at 7:49 pm
Agree completely!