I have been working at the liquor store for almost a year now and this first sales/retail type job. Before this I was in the corporate world, working payroll for an oil company. So there are many differences between the two jobs. Interaction with people is a big thing. For the oil company my interaction only was over the phone trying to answer questions people call in and ask for. Where working at the liquor store the interaction is face to face. And the variety of people keeps on surprising me on almost everyday I work. We have people like doctors and CEO's to people who are looking for anything they can get with the change they have. Another thing that has surprised me is the relationships that are built with the customers. In many cases I can't tell you anyone’s name but know what they drink, know if their kids are in town visiting, know what type of job they have, know the car they drive, and know they area they live in. It’s just amazing to me to how much I've been able to learn about how to interact with so many kinds of people over this last year. The difference between my payroll job is for the most part I was talking to the same person day in and day out.
I agree. You can't beat the face-to-face you get in retail. I work at Academy and I interact with people all day long. I think to be success in business working in retail you can learn a lot. You learn how to read people and how talk to a variety of people and you never know who can meet through retail. I actually got a job offer by talking to a guy who came into the Academy and was impressed with my people skills. I developed these skills by working in retail and learning valuable lessons on how to interact with people.
ReplyDeleteI love working retail and sales for just the pure fact of getting to interact and meet some great people. I work at Oreilly Auto Parts in the evenings as a second job and I have been fortunate enough to get to work mornings every once and a while and it is such a major difference between the people in the mornings and the people at night! The people at night are rushed and cranky, also it seems to be the younger and middle aged people to come in. The mornings was the older generations that aren't in a hurry and just wanna tell you a story. Those type of people are the people that I love getting to talk to they have some of the most amazing stories sometimes!
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