Any Experience is Good Experience - Retail Stores

One of the most important things you can do for yourself to get into the fashion industry is to get some retail store or internship experience. Ideally, I would highly suggest intern experience to have exposure to the industry and to start making connections. If you are located nowhere near a corporate retail office, I would highly suggest applying to stores with product that you are interested in.

Positions within a Store:


Every store has a General Manager or Store Manager, who runs and is responsible for the success of the daily operations and profitability of the store. Most stores have an Assistant Manager and/or Key Holder. The Assistant Manager is able to make most important decisions when the General Manager is not around and is more or less known as the right hand man to the Store Manager. The Key Holder is one more level down and holds the key to the store. Therefore, when the General Manager and Assistant Manager are not around, the Key Holder is next in line and has the key to open and close the store. He/She is responsible for the procedures to open/close the store properly.

Within a store you will also have Sales Associates and/or a Stock person. If the store is small with a tighter staff, the Sales Associate will sometimes operate as the Stocker and will help unpack inventory that comes in or pack up inventory to be sent out. The most popular position and the position most think of when they think of working in a store is a Sales Associate.

Star of the Show - Sales Associate:

Some may think working as a Sales Associate at a store is meaningless and would not help you learn anything about the industry. Surprisingly, retail store experience is not only important for you to understand store operations but also many companies look for employees that have worked in stores. You understand a whole different level in retail when you actually work in a store. Understanding store operations is incredibly important - from the day-to-day, from before the store opens in the morning to closing the store for the night. Along the way, you will learn how to sell to customers and what customers are looking for. As a Sales Associate, you are the front-line employee and bring profitability into the store - the star of the show. The corporate office look upon the Sales Associates to help drive the business and sales; to build relationships with customers and potential customers and to bring the customers back to increase profitability. Without the Sales Associates, there is no point to have the store.

Luxury stores ensure they properly train the Sales Associates with the product knowledge needed in order to romance the clients into purchasing the product - really explaining the the client the process that goes into making the luxury piece. There is a strong relationship between the corporate office and the Sales Associates in the store when it comes to luxury products. The level of appreciation for the product is highly-valued and the corporate office needs the Sales Associates to communicate the brand's philosophy to the clients.

Additional Benefits of a Sales Associate:


If you are able to make fabulous connections with clients, you could potentially make working in a store your career. Some Sales Associates work on a commission basis, so you are responsible for your own salary. You  work for yourself and the harder you work and the better you are, the more you will make. Excellent Sales Associates can make well into six figures.

Lastly, some stores try to motivate their employees by creating selling incentives. Often times, the store will create a contest in which the Sales Associate with the highest sales in a specific product or item will win a prize. Sometimes the prize is a gift certificate to the store or to a restaurant or spa and sometimes it is actual product from the store. Some retailers will fly their top Sales Associates to the corporate headquarters for a special recognition meeting.

Welcome!

Welcome to my first posting!

I've decided to start a blog on how one that is interested in joining the Retail and Fashion industry to how one can actually join in on the fun in the industry. For my undergraduate degree, I attended Boston University and graduated hoping to join the Retail industry. Little did I know how challenging it was to break into the industry without knowing much. Had I attended Parsons The New School for Design, Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT) or another fashion or design school, I probably would have been in better shape. This blog is for everyone who realized in college or later in life that they would like to be in Fashion/Retail.

I plan on elaborating on different roles and the differences between each role without the industry through my blog posts. I hope someone will find this to be not only informational, but also helpful to finding a position within the complicated world of Retail.