My wife loves purses. In fact she loves them so much that she has them displayed on a wall in our home. Personally, I don’t get it but it makes her happy. So image our surprise when we went to our local outlet mall and we’re stopped at the door of a designer purse shop because we had to wait in line to get in. There was no sale, no specials, just a routine day at the mall. As far as I could tell, there were about a dozen people actually in the store and four people queuing up waiting for four of those lucky insiders to leave. Curious, I asked the young lady at the door why. Her answer? They didn’t want the store to be too crowded. We went to another store.
The practice of having people stand in line just to get into a store angers me on several levels. It reeks of poor management and lousy leadership from the view of the patron, the employee and the manager.
I looked at the patron’s view. As a potential customer I felt unwelcome. The young lady standing outside of the store at the door became a physical and psychological barrier that let me know that the store did not welcome my presence or my business ‐whether they needed it or not.
I thought about it from the employee’s view. “Great another day of standing outside doing traffic control and getting snarky remarks from people when I could be selling that cute little blue number in the window. Tomorrow, I’ll see if the store across the street has any openings where I can actually sell something.
I thought about the manager who follows this policy in June when there are not masses pushing and shoving to get to the cute little blue number in the window. The whole thing is absolutely ridiculous. It may make sense the day after Thanksgiving but not on a Saturday in April even if some people do consider baseball opening day to be a national holiday.
So why do it in the first place? My first thought was loss prevention. If shoplifting is that big of a problem hire a security guard. Is it too expensive? If that’s the case, the employee standing outside the door is nothing more than cheap, unskilled labor. Is she trained to stop a shoplifter? Is she even trained to spot one and if so, how can she if she’s outside watching people stand in line? Unless her job is to keep potential thieves from entering the store in the first place, the loss prevention angle isn’t looking good.
Next, I considered the possibility that the store wanted to create an atmosphere of wealth and exclusivity. You know, like those clubs where you stand in line all night to pay a huge cover charge you don’t have to be in the same room (albeit miles away) with some celebrity you don’t – and will probably never – know. None of that matters because you can say that you were there. Well, if that’s the reason for the line I’m thinking an outlet mall is the wrong place. People are there looking for deep discounts on perfume and shoes, not celebrities and expensive drinks. The concept is pretentious and hopefully, people are smart enough to see through it.
So if it’s not loss prevention or posturing, what is it? It’s a memo from corporate and this is where managers need to stand up and manage. This is when they must be brave enough to tell corporate that what works on 5th Avenue won’t necessarily work in anytown USA. Listen up managers ‐ this is your call to action. Your job is to make your company successful. It is not part of your job; it is your only job. How do you do that? Simple – don’t be afraid to ask questions. If you are afraid that you will be fired for asking questions, turn in your resignation – you are not ready to manage anyone let alone lead them . Question any policy that lowers team morale and drives away customers. Question any policy that not only allows but instructs you to give your patrons and your staff less than the very best you have to offer. Yes, the head office will dictate policy from above because it seems best for the entire company but they will never know that a blanket approach won’t always work ‐ unless someone tells them. If you don’t tell them, the person replacing you will.