My book on my retail career, Shops, Shoppers, Shopping & Shafted, will be out soon. It merges Retail Confidential and Much Calamity & The Redundance Kid.
A MESS FROM HEAD TO TOE
I was a retail manager, of
supermarkets mainly, for the best part of forty years, starting out in Northern
Ireland (Stewarts Supermarkets, Penneys, BHS), then around various parts of
England and that has given me more than a fair degree of inside knowledge. If I add many more years as an
observing customer, I think I have a valid point of view on a number of factors
concerning shops, shoppers and shopping.
The world changes, of course, but in some cases, not for the
better. I will highlight one area
that has become sloppy – employee appearance. Department stores and smaller shops are of a higher
standard, generally speaking, but supermarkets let the side down badly. Of course, there are some supermarket
employees who take pride in their appearance but they are in the minority.
The standard of dress/appearance of
supermarket staff has gone downhill fast and it is depressing. I come from an
era (starting in the 1970s) when Staff Managers, rather like old-fashioned
Matrons in hospitals, would do a daily patrol of all staff and managers to
check compliance with the dress standards code in the employee handbook. They
were strict but effective. We were all terrified of them but, particularly in
comparison to today, what they did worked well. They were policing an important part of the company image.
It was ‘old school’ but it worked. Anyone or anything not complying and the
employee would be sent away, including back home, until their appearance was
deemed acceptable.
A typical inspection would assess
whether or not each employee was well-groomed, in ironed clothing, wearing
clean footwear and free from body odour. In addition, male staff would be
observed for unacceptable beards or sideburns and female staff would be
examined for any excessive ear, neck and finger jewellery. Clean fingernails were expected from
everyone and female staff, specifically, were encouraged not to use garish nail
polish. Visible tattoos on both sexes were taboo.
Nowadays, nobody wants to hurt
anyone's feelings because everyone has "a right" to be an individual,
the right of freedom of expression, the right to dress and look as they darn
well please. Well, in my humble but experienced retail opinion, both as manager
and customer, it is unacceptable.
Every time I shop in a supermarket of
whatever brand, I see at least one grubby-looking employee preparing, handling
and serving fresh food, working checkouts, or mooching about the shop doing
whatever job they are employed to do.
But whatever role they play, each employee should be conscious of how
they look. If only they did that three-word
check before they start work – neat, clean, tidy – oh, how things would improve
dramatically.
The most recent example was a lad on
a fish counter. He was a mess from head to toe, greasy, uncombed hair, shaggy
beard, quite a bit of face jewellery, tattoos from his wrists to the edge
of his short-sleeved shirt and filthy fingernails.
In another
store, the young man on the checkout had clearly been dragged through a hedge
backwards and was in some kind of razor-denial cult. He looked dreadful.
But, then again, he was allowed to start work looking like that. His fault?
Yes. Management fault? Definitely.
A girl on a delicatessen counter in a
different supermarket was wearing her trilby hat at a jaunty angle, choosing to
see it as a fashion accessory rather than a head cover. It was as if a Frank Sinatra impression
was more favourable than a testament to hygiene standards.
Who is recruiting people like this?
Who is managing standards of appearance these days? The way employees look in some customer service environments
has been pushed way down the management agenda. In fact, it may have dropped
off the supervisory radar altogether. Bring back the HR retail Matrons,
say I. But that’s not going to happen because anything
goes and if it is not reined in, then, by default, it becomes acceptable
policy. I repeat - lank hair,
tattoos, face jewellery, stubble, scuffed shoes, dirty fingernails and on and
on, coupled with poor manners seem to be the order of the day. Surely store managers see the same
things I and other customers are seeing, or perhaps they need to book
appointments with Specsavers.
Supermarket
bosses seem to talk about variety, offers and customer service when trying to
explain their successes or their woes. But the big players in the industry are
all trading on common ground.
Price and choice are very similar.
Customer service is all over the place, inconsistent and a lottery. The management gurus talk about ‘points
of difference’ when comparing companies but, for me and I am certain for many
other customers a big difference would be neat, clean and tidy staff especially
in meat, bakery, deli, pizza and fish departments et al. Pristine customer servants (let us not
gloss the job) would increase trust immediately. Add to those essentials an obsessive, compulsive attitude to
frequent hand washing in fresh food areas and I would be a regular and faithful
customer.
In order to get close to the ideally
presented supermarket person, recruiters must be ruthless in hiring employees
and managers on a day-to-day basis must insist on high standards of
appearance. I am not really that
nostalgic for Matrons of old but I do think a modern equivalent should be
found. We should applaud managers
and staff who make the effort and take pride in themselves. We should never
accept the scruffs.
My book on my retail career, Shops,
Shoppers, Shopping & Shafted, will be out soon.
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