Seasonal retail employees prepare for their big test — Black Friday
Hours into Rose Porter’s second day on the job, the line of shoppers inside the J.C. Penney store in Henderson had grown nine people deep.
Porter, 64, remembered her training. Call for help if need be. Make the customer feel acknowledged.
“Sorry,” she called out to those in line. “We’ll be right with you.”
Porter, one of 200 seasonal employees recruited to work November and December at the Henderson store, had a natural rapport with customers. She complimented them on the clothes they’d picked. She apologized if she felt she took too long.
“I’m still nervous,” Porter said. “But everyone has been so helpful answering my questions.”
A former office manager who had been unemployed for eight months, Porter was among 85 people hired through J.C. Penney’s annual job fair in October, and one of 7,000 seasonal workers across multiple retailers this season in Nevada, according to Retail Association of Nevada estimates.
Those seasonal workers can expect to be tested on Black Friday, when an estimated 116 million people nationwide plan to shop, according to the National Retail Federation trade group.
The group expects retail sales in November and December to increase at least 4.3 percent over 2017 for a total of at least $717.45 billion.
The Retail Association of Nevada predicts 1.6 million Nevadans will shop or think about shopping between Thursday and Monday. The association predicts up to $562 million will be spent across the state during that time, a nearly 6 percent increase year over year.
Training new employees
Porter happened upon J.C. Penney’s job fair Oct. 16 when she walked into the Henderson store to shop that day.
About a week later, she sat at orientation in the employees’ break room, steps away from where interviewers quizzed candidates on how they’d react to shoppers’ questions.
Porter’s orientation group included five other women who hoped to turn seasonal jobs into something more. Among them was Brianna Diaz, a Basic Academy student at her first job, and a mother of seven in her 30s who’d returned to the workforce after she almost died from diabetes complications.
They came ready to work.
“I’ll take any time,” Porter told the orientation leader. “I’m bored just staying at home.”
In the course of about six hours spread over two days, the leader, Mark Schoenfeldt, taught the temporary workers the computer system, the company history. More important, he taught them the company’s culture and how it does business. Schoenfeldt chose to lead every orientation; an employee on the floor without a grasp of Penney’s mission could be hard to retrain.
The trainees watched videos on how to interact with customers and report harassment. They played a J.C. Penney-designed board game with cards quizzing the seasonal workers on how to help customers in different scenarios.
As part of their training, the seasonal workers spent two four-hour shifts shadowing a veteran employee.
Schoenfeldt emphasized some key goals this holiday season. Tell customers about items sold under J.C. Penney brand names, like Arizona and athletic brand Xersion. Tell customers about the cellphone app. Tell customers about the company-branded credit card.
Amid the business talk, Schoenfeldt also told his group about company programs to benefit its employees. Workers get 25 percent off items on top of any store deals. In addition, Penney’s donates $150 in employees’ names to any charity to which they donate 10 hours of service.
“We know that if we take care of you guys, you take care of the customers,” Schoenfeldt said.
Preparing for Black Friday
By early November, Diaz, the high school student in Porter’s class, felt confident in her Black Friday debut.
She learned the computer system quickly. She received compliments from supervisors for her outgoing personality and ability to speak to customers in English and Spanish.
“I haven’t had any surprises,” said Diaz, 17. “Everything has turned out how I’ve expected.”
Porter thought that after some more training on the sales floor and with the help of veteran workers, she’d be ready by Black Friday.
“I’ll be OK after some more experience,” she said in early November. “I’d like to be hired on after the holidays.”
Now comes the big test: Black Friday. Porter was assigned to the fine jewelry department, one of the busier sections. She felt more familiar with the store and its systems, and had bought more comfortable shoes for the long hours of standing.
“I think I’m ready,” she said.
Contact Wade Tyler Millward at 702-383-4602 or wmillward@reviewjournal.com. Follow @wademillward on Twitter.
High stakes for Penney’s
This season is an especially important one for J.C. Penney, a company in a state of transition. This year, it lost a CEO, CFO and chief customer officer.
New CEO Jill Soltau, appointed in October and the first woman to lead the company in its 116-year history, comes with 30 years of retail experience. She previously served as CEO of fabric retailer Joann Stores.
Multiple analyst notes from financial firms have been bullish on Soltau’s hiring. But she has a lot of work ahead of her.
The company’s annual retail sales have lagged behind competitors Macy’s, Nordstrom and Kohl’s since 2013, according to research by financial firm Morgan Stanley. Penney’s share price has fallen from $11.57 in March 2016 to $1.29 on Tuesday.
The company has suspended guidance for its next fiscal year while its new leadership settles in, but said itexpects lower comparative sales. Instead of flat sales, it predicts a decrease of less than 10 percent.
For its survival, J.C. Penney needs to attract younger shoppers and improve its inventory, according to a note to investors from investment bank B. Riley FBR.
The company has too much debt prohibiting needed investment and may need to close stores next year, according to the note.
“The company has been ‘through the ringer,’ in our opinion, several times,” according to the note. “We would argue it is difficult to recover from that, especially in the department store space.”
“We have seen other similar situations develop,” the note continued. “In the majority of cases they did not end well over the longer term.”
