Tales of a Retail Nothing

I'd like to talk about retail management today, now this is going to be about in store management not corporate management, because I think the word count on that combination would be exhausting for anyone. Especially me.

I have been lucky enough that for the most part the management I've worked for have been wonderful hard working people. They actually cared both about a store that was not paying them enough and the people who worked for them. Most of my management would always take my side over the customers.

I'm not sure if writing the bad stuff first is good or the good stuff first is good.

I think I'm going to start with the bad stuff so we can end on a high note.

I've been working since I was 14 (babysitting before that which was WILD anyone would trust a child with a child), I'm 30 now, so more than half my life. I've worked in order a dental office, a daycare, whatever the mess that the Sears photography place was, a greeting card company, a TA and gear manager in college, a camera store, Mitchell's (also known in this series as the big box craft store), and a reptile place.

I have had a lot of experience with working with the public, and I enjoy it most of the time. Which is kind of weird since I am both an extreme introvert and autistic, so sensory overload is an easy thing. I think it creates compelling characters in writing and honestly I don't mind jumping jobs. Plus it's kinda like science.

I am currently dealing with the worst disrespect I've ever experienced in retail, I'm not going to go into too much detail because it is getting taken care of very soon. I mean working retail is a bummer but I'm pretty sure this chapter of my adventure is an unnecessary departure from my usual chaotic kindness. It is too bad of a story to tell right now, maybe, with time that will change.

I have been lucky to have competent managers, not all of them were excellent managers, or people for that matter, but the bar was always at a somewhat mediocre height and everyone met it. Some went above and beyond.

I was also a manager in the frame shop, it was a small crew dealing with complicated things. So in this piece I'm going to talk about my own retail management experience because my favorite boss agreed to interview for this series so you'll get to see another side of things.

I managed both my college gear cage and two different frame shops in "Mitchell's". The gear cage (I know odd phrasing) was a place where I really got to shine in my knowledge of photography. My concentration was in photo, my favorite place in the world is still a darkroom.

It was incredibly rewarding to be discussing art with other students, especially younger ones, and professors who you admired your work and you admired theirs.

It was most rewarding to talk about concept, after someone gets through the 100 level art courses they get hit with "okay your technical skills are down now we're going to make you rip your heart out so we can all see it". I will write about concept in my art series, which will definitely be happening eventually.

That will always be my favorite job, and while it wasn't retail it started getting me used to talking people through things in different ways because everyone learns differently. I would go back to teaching photography in a second, but schools expensive and I'd need a teaching degree.

I gained a lot of confidence in that job, it was just the right amount of pressure to take at the same time I was in courses.

My next job will be another day. We're going to jump back to Mitchell's.

So when I made the jump from framer to frame manager I had about enough experience to have a conversation with my crew. There was so much to learn. I'm going to give you two of my favorite "can I speak to the manager?" Stories.

The first one was not when I was managing the store, but the fit this woman gave was incredible. It was one of those moments that you wouldn't believe unless you saw it yourself.

This was a high volume shop, we had about 25-30 frames (triple that around Christmas) to get done a day. Custom framing takes a lot of time, especially if the piece is huge or unique.

This woman had taped her glass to her frame. Tape residue is not easy for anyone to get off. We didn't have time. So I called her and told her that I was giving her a free upgrade to our non-glare glass. She thought it was wonderful on the phone, she said thank you, she hangs up.

The next day she came in and my manager was the one to actually give her the frame. All of a sudden "that's not my frame".

This was not possible. We did not carry that particular frame even in custom, and if we did our premade frames only went up to 24x36. Her frame was 40x60.

She sued. Or tried. She was offered a new full custom frame for free, but she decided she didn't like any of our moldings. So for some reason, instead of backing my poor manager, the company backed the customer and found her a frame from a different company to get her to stop harassing them.

Now retail managers can deal with a lot of shit, but my manager was yelled at by this woman, and then the company bought something from another company in order to shut her up.

I know I said that twice. It was not an accident. This was like number two of the most bizarre situations I've been in the middle of at work. The customer decided to claim that I broke her frame because I called to tell her I upgraded it and that meant I changed the frame. In reality I did nothing to the frame, and I did not have time to scrape tape residue off her glass.

I think I needed to get that one off my chest for a while because it ended up being longer than intended. Watching my manager get degraded like that, when if anything we made her frame look better, was awful and bizarre.

On to me! I'm going to share a very positive experience with a customer coming in to "speak to the manager" because we could all use a little joy in our lives. I'm sure I'll get to some more negatives later. There's enough to balance my joy, trust me.

I was managing my second shop, and I was training one of my part timers so I was at the counter. A woman came up and she was already in tears, she had a younger man with her.

Now often these types of interactions are really exhausting. Please do not trauma dump on your cashiers, or bartenders, or framers or what ever. Find a therapist. Just because we are doing something that feels personal does not mean we need to know everything.

However when they rolled out their piece I recognized it, it was the memorial piece I had framed about twenty times for a firefighter who had died locally on the job.

Oh, I promise all my positive stories are not about death. It might scream otherwise right now but I suppose the emotional stuff is easier to parse at the moment for me.

So I told them that I had been framing that piece a lot, so I was going to let the person I was training do as much as they could while I watched. My framer handled it beautifully, and especially so after we found out that the customers were his mother and best friend. It was heavy.

I always made sure I prepared people I trained as much as I could, because sometimes you end up holding someone by the register because their kid just died.

The amount of empathy and reasonable detachment (that's kind of the hardest part) that she showed allowed room for their grief but also effectively got the work done. I was really proud. By the end of the design and transaction I saw the woman laugh a little at something the framer was telling her. Then she asked to speak to the manager, I walked over and the woman said to me that she had waited so long because she was dreading the process and the framer made her feel comfortable. She was excited to see the finished product.

There's a lot more soul in retail than people think, and most of the stories I want to tell are those of genuine human connection and funny things. There will be kind of horrible things as well, but I'm going to try not to subject you all to too much. My other work can be dark, why not make this one fun?

So I suppose, for now, remember that you can really connect with someone in a fifteen minute time frame if you listen to them. There are lessons that working with and for so many different people that can't be taught anywhere else. There are ways to change peoples minds.

-later

river

Part one:

Part Two: