Archived Another Beauty thread. I'm considering quitting, I can't do this anymore

[Joel]

Basically I'm so sick and tired of the stupid management and their ridiculous unrealistic expectations.

First of all they want us tt finish our trucks in less than 3 hours; however, they (ETLs and TLs) don't fucking understand that every day the cosmetic truck may be different, and sometimes it may take longer than 3 hours to finish it, sometimes it may take as long as 6 hours if there are a lot of Repacks and boxes , still they don't care they insist it has to be done under 3 hours. Sometimes under quite stupid expectationewe don't even finish our truck cause they want us to start Guests Servicing.

Second they want us to backstock out stuff in some huge heavy ass mobile backroom thing. Trust me those two things are already ouo of room for any backstock. We miss the normal backroom because taking those things from the back it's a big pain in the ass. Way too heavy and barely any room.

Aknowledge every single guess I've been pulled into the office because of this. Apparently I should bevdr miss any guest. They have even spied ne to make sure I'm asking all guests if they're "finding everything ok". Anotner TL told me that I should try to upsell something Honestly, a lot of women do get pissed for me to asking shit, one of them complained with and ETL about how we don't let them make their purchases peacefully without us interrupting them.

I'm so sick of this. I used to have a lot of freedom before in this department, but now we don't have any. It's too much pressure, I'm already over the edge with too much stress, every day I clock out with a bad tension headache.

 

[NKG]

Basically I'm so sick and tired of the stupid management and their ridiculous unrealistic expectations.

First of all they want us tt finish our trucks in less than 3 hours; however, they (ETLs and TLs) don't fucking understand that every day the cosmetic truck may be different, and sometimes it may take longer than 3 hours to finish it, sometimes it may take as long as 6 hours if there are a lot of Repacks and boxes , still they don't care they insist it has to be done under 3 hours. Sometimes under quite stupid expectationewe don't even finish our truck cause they want us to start Guests Servicing.

Second they want us to backstock out stuff in some huge heavy ass mobile backroom thing. Trust me those two things are already ouo of room for any backstock. We miss the normal backroom because taking those things from the back it's a big pain in the ass. Way too heavy and barely any room.

Aknowledge every single guess I've been pulled into the office because of this. Apparently I should bevdr miss any guest. They have even spied ne to make sure I'm asking all guests if they're "finding everything ok". Anotner TL told me that I should try to upsell something Honestly, a lot of women do get pissed for me to asking shit, one of them complained with and ETL about how we don't let them make their purchases peacefully without us interrupting them.

I'm so sick of this. I used to have a lot of freedom before in this department, but now we don't have any. It's too much pressure, I'm already over the edge with too much stress, every day I clock out with a bad tension headache.

Is the 3 hours including other areas like pharamacy? Is flow involved? Beauty is not supposed to backstock thats backroom. When you do help guests make sure to recommend products if they are buying make-up remover, do they need the cotton pads? I always greeted guests with "hi, Are you finding the eye shadow you needed? " If they brush you off just be like Ill be over here if you do need help.

 

[Hardlinesmaster]

End to end at your store is not working..

 

[HRZone]

You never answered this in your last vent thread. Beauty isnt supposed to backstock. Did you ask your TL why logistics isn't doing it?

Beauty gets a lot of hours to maintain such a small area of the store, if you guys are that far behind someone on your team isn't carrying their weight.

At my store last week beauty got 127 hours while market only got 180. You guys have nowhere near the workload as them. Something is wrong with that.

 

[Flow Warrior]

the questions I would like to know are:

1. How many are on your team and do you overlap
2. Why are you backstocking? The fast mover cart is supposed to be on location. Thats its purpose. Its so you have stuff available immediately. Its supposed to be organized.
3. Yes you are supposed to upsell thats why you got the raise and the rest of the salesfloor didn't. This is the one job where you get to talk about makeup, so ask guests about that. Be polite, but don't press. Always ask an open ended question. Then the guest has to say no.

In my store we have 5 cosmetics ladies, they are staggered. One is assigned to do truck and the others to sell (guest servicing.) They carry the keys to the locked security cases (because people want to steal razors, toothbrushes, white white strips and tide pods )
When there is one on none, someone else (like me or a night person) does their freight. Before you quit, see if you can answer the questions.

 

[FlowTeamChick]

Yeah, I recently bowed out of the one or two beauty shifts I got each week. That tiny bump in pay was definitely not worth it. When I'm shopping, I want to shop my list and leave. I'm not a browser, so I get what you mean about guests wanting to do their shopping in peace. And as a TM, I just don't care about beauty stuff enough to know how to even try to up sell. You want just your regular moisturizer? Great, it's right here, have a terrific day. (And before anyone assumes that I was hired to work beauty and should have known what it was all about, I wasn't. I'm flow and was pushing truck cosmetics when we moved in the e2e process.)

 

[Rock Lobster]

The entire direction as of late, IMO, is absolutely insane. I used to think that the old leadership wasn’t capable of making basic decisions, but it appears that somebody in the company is even more misguided. I think Brian is a very smart guy, and that somebody under him for stores is definitely is feeling pressure and this is their response to not get fired yet.

To be clear, “selling” is not a business strategy. It’s not a solution or a tool for stores. In fact, it is an opportunity cost. We are banking that having TMs bugging our guests is going to add more sales than, oh idk, stocking the freight earlier... and that is a gamble I would definitely not take.

 

[Bosch]

The entire direction as of late, IMO, is absolutely insane. I used to think that the old leadership wasn’t capable of making basic decisions, but it appears that somebody in the company is even more misguided. I think Brian is a very smart guy, and that somebody under him for stores is definitely is feeling pressure and this is their response to not get fired yet.

To be clear, “selling” is not a business strategy. It’s not a solution or a tool for stores. In fact, it is an opportunity cost. We are banking that having TMs bugging our guests is going to add more sales than, oh idk, stocking the freight earlier... and that is a gamble I would definitely not take.

Yeah cause my salesfloor is looking really light while my backrooms are barfing into every spare vehicle the vomit can find. Cause they would rather have the three people that they want on the floor bugging guests or stuck on a register. No one is moving the damn freight! You won't have sales if people can't buy it. And they can't shop the back room..

 

[balthrop]

Yeah cause my salesfloor is looking really light while my backrooms are barfing into every spare vehicle the vomit can find. Cause they would rather have the three people that they want on the floor bugging guests or stuck on a register. No one is moving the damn freight! You won't have sales if people can't buy it. And they can't shop the back room..

we now have 2 and a half aisles of CHEM, PLAS and BPLS stuck in every place it will fit and a few that might raise a few eyebrows, PLUG is rapidly filling up, PAPR is cramped as PLAS. and yet the sales floor is kinda vacant like our management. So what ever this company thinks is working well lets all agree to do the opposite and we might have a chance of not becoming the next K Mart. the best we can hope for I think is a mercy loan from Mr. Bezos.

 

[Rock Lobster]

Yeah cause my salesfloor is looking really light while my backrooms are barfing into every spare vehicle the vomit can find. Cause they would rather have the three people that they want on the floor bugging guests or stuck on a register. No one is moving the damn freight! You won't have sales if people can't buy it. And they can't shop the back room..

Yes this is what is happening at any stores that are doing what they are telling you, only those ignoring the directions are surviving.

This is what happens though. Target has no idea, but I blame years of flawed culture around promoting which has caused the most issues. Those that wanted to promote are the ones that should not have, and those that should have promoted were too smart to stick their necks out like that for the instability. We now, as a company, are stuck with store leadership teams that know the direction is bad decision making, but their bosses (district and above) are making calls that they cannot fight against and the stores are paying the price.

You know what happens when you strip the resources (payroll) from stores? We get the bare minimum done (filling the floor, zone, reshop)... you know what happens when you switch the focus and tell stores on the same resources to achieve service staffing (tables, fitting rooms, depts) unlike anything we have done in the past 15 years and don’t address those problems? The freight doesn’t get worked.... and a store with light salesfloor staffing for a week can be ignored, but any leftover trailer cannot. I’m honestly pissed that the answers are so obvious and yet anyone with foresight 10 years ago should have seen this coming... those recent college grads did a decent amount of damage a decade ago in their stores... but now they are grown up, they are the BPs and DTLs and above that are on our asses to save their asses using their terrible ideas!

 

[HiddenPenguin]

Second they want us to backstock out stuff in some huge heavy ass mobile backroom thing.

2. Why are you backstocking? The fast mover cart is supposed to be on location. Thats its purpose. Its so you have stuff available immediately. Its supposed to be organized.

I believe the OP is talking about backstocking into Wacos on the mobile cart..?

 

[HRZone]

We are banking that having TMs bugging our guests is going to add more sales than, oh idk, stocking the freight earlier..

I almost hate that we had a huge sales year because I think it gives a false sense that changing to a focus of selling caused the sales to rebound.

In reality, fresh brands, a well stocked store and friendly service will do the selling for us

 

[HiddenPenguin]

@Joel You've been with Target a few years, right? Even if your beauty leadership is all over the map, do you have any trusted TLs/SrTLs/ETLs/HR that you can talk to about this? Even if it's just to privately vent frustrations and/or get reassurance that someone recognizes your hard work?

Alternatively, can you switch workcenters?

 

[Bosch]

we now have 2 and a half aisles of CHEM, PLAS and BPLS stuck in every place it will fit and a few that might raise a few eyebrows, PLUG is rapidly filling up, PAPR is cramped as PLAS. and yet the sales floor is kinda vacant like our management. So what ever this company thinks is working well lets all agree to do the opposite and we might have a chance of not becoming the next K Mart. the best we can hope for I think is a mercy loan from Mr. Bezos.

Yep..

 

[commiecorvus]

Yes this is what is happening at any stores that are doing what they are telling you, only those ignoring the directions are surviving.

This is what happens though. Target has no idea, but I blame years of flawed culture around promoting which has caused the most issues. Those that wanted to promote are the ones that should not have, and those that should have promoted were too smart to stick their necks out like that for the instability. We now, as a company, are stuck with store leadership teams that know the direction is bad decision making, but their bosses (district and above) are making calls that they cannot fight against and the stores are paying the price.

You know what happens when you strip the resources (payroll) from stores? We get the bare minimum done (filling the floor, zone, reshop)... you know what happens when you switch the focus and tell stores on the same resources to achieve service staffing (tables, fitting rooms, depts) unlike anything we have done in the past 15 years and don’t address those problems? The freight doesn’t get worked.... and a store with light salesfloor staffing for a week can be ignored, but any leftover trailer cannot. I’m honestly pissed that the answers are so obvious and yet anyone with foresight 10 years ago should have seen this coming... those recent college grads did a decent amount of damage a decade ago in their stores... but now they are grown up, they are the BPs and DTLs and above that are on our asses to save their asses using their terrible ideas!

Quoted for truth and because sometimes the people at Spot pay attention to what @Rock Lobster has to say.

This is no way to run a railroad and the only stores who are accomplishing this are the one who are figuring out how to game the system.

 

[Rock Lobster]

Quoted for truth and because sometimes the people at Spot pay attention to what @Rock Lobster has to say.

This is no way to run a railroad and the only stores who are accomplishing this are the one who are figuring out how to game the system.

Thanks, and I don't want to come off as negative on these topics, but its crazy that I have SO much confidence in our current CEO and his strategies, but the least amount of trust on those that are executing it. It was the opposite with Gregg, and its so frustrating to watch!

At the end of the day, we are pushing the stores to a breaking point. Anybody on the receiving end of this can look at what Brian is saying and say, "Yes! About time somebody gets it!" and then have tons of different field leaders coming into stores demanding certain results that honestly are not possible given the resources currently. In 2020, when all these plans come to reality, sure, let's talk then about selling and service culture... but you just sundered our supply chain process within stores without any actual improvements to DC Operations, so its the same amount of payroll to get it done (just in a different manner). Then field leaders act like now that we are spending less payroll on replenishment that there is extra payroll floating around for service! Nope, you just cut payroll from filling the floor and the workload stayed the same. Either we are adding payroll to get it done or its rolling all over the place.

I could go on about this all day... But I have no control over these problems. I have to keep my head down and watch as this thing is heading for a brick wall, and our only hope is things start changing fast with supply chain so that the payroll stores receive starts matching the workload, or store teams are going to start turning over!

 

[Joel]

You never answered this in your last vent thread. Beauty isnt supposed to backstock. Did you ask your TL why logistics isn't doing it?

Beauty gets a lot of hours to maintain such a small area of the store, if you guys are that far behind someone on your team isn't carrying their weight.

At my store last week beauty got 127 hours while market only got 180. You guys have nowhere near the workload as them. Something is wrong with that.

My whole store actually (the rest of hardlines) starts E2E actually tomorrow. Tomorrow every department takes/will take care of their own backstock. There will no longer be any backroom team anymore.

HR actually takes hours from Beauty to give other departments, we can tell by looking at the daily grid. Some TM from for example Softlines are unfsr Beauty.

 

[HRZone]

HR actually takes hours from Beauty to give other departments, we can tell by looking at the daily grid. Some TM from for example Softlines are unfsr Beauty.

And so what conversation do you have to your tl or leadership about that?

 

[Joel]

And so what conversation do you have to your tl or leadership about that?

I was told by ETL-HR that they can do if they wanted to

 

[Anelmi]

Case in point: the beauty “sample” table. A TM is supposed to be hovering near this table to introduce product and offer tips and push beauty sales. How is this even plausible? The only beauty table thing I did my entire shift was set it up. The rest was devoted to pushing leftover freight from the past 3 days, backing up the lanes, answering phone calls and call boxes. To think I would just kill a shift manning the beauty table is ridiculous and a complete waste of my time and Spots $.

 

[HRZone]

Case in point: the beauty “sample” table. A TM is supposed to be hovering near this table to introduce product and offer tips and push beauty sales. How is this even plausible? The only beauty table thing I did my entire shift was set it up. The rest was devoted to pushing leftover freight from the past 3 days, backing up the lanes, answering phone calls and call boxes. To think I would just kill a shift manning the beauty table is ridiculous and a complete waste of my time and Spots $.

Our store only uses the table when we have double coverage in beauty. So if there are two tms It does make sense to have one run the table while the other does the task. We have a mid on Fridays Saturdays and Sundays during peak hours.

Stores are required to staff beauty open to close. Some don't use mids at all.

Even if you don't use mids that's 100 plus hours per week. I don't get how there isn't time to get your job done considering how little freight there is compared to other work centers

 

[Anelmi]

Well...we were pushing all of HBA/pharmacy freight. And as the mid, since I’m crosstrained, I have been functioning as a floater due to callouts/NCNS/etc. The goal is there (beauty table)...it just hasn’t happened yet.

 

[RhettB]

Freight is hit or miss. One day I can have 1 tall U-Boat of box freight and 10 repacks. Next day, 2 repack and box freight fits into a cart. Plus the Beauth TM has to do research every day. Sampling cart is a no-option Fri/Sat/Sun 10 am to 7pm.

 

[HLN13]

Complete opposite of my store. The beauty tm’s literallt stand around and do nothing. Flow pushes the truck, and Hardlines normally pushes their pulls since they aren’t supposed to leave beauty (to go and get the pull). Only thing they really do is zone and research like 5 aisles..

 

[Anelmi]

I just came from a different Target store (one of the busiest stores in the country) and the beauty TM was standing next to this elaborate display. I walked by 3 times and not a single time did she smile, say hi or even acknowledge my presence even though I made eye contact. She looked out of place and uncomfortable and was, most definitely, not selling a single blessed thing even though there were gobs of people milling around. To me, that is a waste of hours.