Archived Beauty Expectations

[Cynder]

It seems like every couple of weeks, our district leader will come in and add something new to what they want us to do every every day for Beauty team. Does this happen with anyone else?

First they told us they expected us to go for backup and cart parties.
Then they wanted us to focus more on engaging guests and up-selling/adding to the cart.
Then they introduced that huge metro they want us to work out of on the floor.
Then sampling on the the weekends.
Then wearing those aprons.
Now scanning outs every day.

Leave us alone!

It seems like getting repacks done are becoming the last priority, when I know better because SFS can't do their jobs if stuff if supposed to be out on the floor and it's not yet, guests come in knowing exactly when a certain item is supposed to be on the floor and I have to explain to them that the beauty truck isn't all pushed even though it's 6pm.

 

[Thunderbird1956]

Up-sale is basic retail engagement. It's not just beauty it's the basics of helping the guest. Doing research has been what beauty has had to do from the start.

Backup depends on how your store prioritizes the backup TMs. ASANTS You should go for backup, but only if Hardlines is helping a guest and you're not.

Someone recently described this situation as the 80-80-80 rule. Each level of management only gives 80% of the picture so everything that the DTL has told you has been in memos, emails, and on workbench from Spot corporate for months (except maybe the aprons), but that information doesn't seem to be filtering down to you until the DTL is there.

 

[HRZone]

@Thunderbird1956 you are spot on.

A couple things to remember -- they have tweaked positions at spot that have been here for years (electronics, apparel, market).

Beauty tm has only been a thing since July of last year so it's not surprising they are tweaking things as they go and learn.

The one thing as a beauty tm is you really just need to focus on selling. Doing research and filling the floor is a huge part of that. Service is important but your area needs to look good.

A beauty tm should be willing to backup but they should also be a last resort, hardlines and softlines are first responders at my store with market and beauty the last resort.

 

[Anelmi]

The directive at my store is unless it's "all hands on deck," beauty TMs don't back up. However, because I'm also trained GS, I'm called up by name to cover breaks/lunches/etc.

Also, if you don't scan for outs, you don't get product. So that should be a priority for sure. Especially since, I was told, cosmetics need a 2-3 week lead time between ordering product and actually receiving product.

 

[IWishIKnew]

Aside from the backup thing, that sounds pretty standard for my store. They are exempt from backup because they carry keys for perfume/cologne cases (electronics is exempt for similar reasons--except way worse because people always need stuff unlocked in electronics, but it's pretty rare in beauty).

I envy y'all the apron. I'd love to have a place to stash extra labels, a pen & paper, a roll of tape, some spare replacement hanger thingies to fix ones that have broken off of peghook items....

 

[FlowTeamChick]

I envy y'all the apron. I'd love to have a place to stash extra labels, a pen & paper, a roll of tape, some spare replacement hanger thingies to fix ones that have broken off of peghook items....

I no longer work beauty, but I still have my zip bag of stuff just like this. Wrote my name on it with a Sharpie marker, keep it stashed nearby with all this stuff plus some rubber bands, paper clips (an unbent one can be handy for getting little things like lip pencils unstuck from fixtures), etc.

 

[Aredhel]

There used to be generic red aprons w big pockets but they seem to have been phased out.

 

[lrou98]

Beauty started out as beauty. Now we must take care of the entire health/pharmacy section plus a few extra aisles immediately after the beauty section. That comes to 35 aisles plus the backwall. Beauty is getting the shaft and it looks it as well. We have no time to do research, zone properly, talk with guests, clean, etc... I'm curious if the other beauty TM's out there are in beauty only or has your sections expanded over time? It's becoming frustrating...I loved being in beauty but now it has become a burden.

 

[IWishIKnew]

I'm not sure about days, as I mostly work nights, but our beauty TMs would generally spend most of their shift standing around if they only had to zone beauty. Evenings don't do research, and if there are any late pulls they won't always have time for zone, but our closing beauty TMs handle their ~40 aisles as well as other hardlines folks handle their ~80 (eg. sometimes it's a quick zone and they get through it, sometimes it's busy or the aisles are a bigger disaster than normal or pulls don't get done during daytime hours, etc.) and they don't get all the way through.

 

[Anelmi]

^^ Yep. When I do beauty shifts, I'm so glad when they tack on the whole of HBA. I actually love doing pharmacy and I get a lot of guest interaction there. Plus I just am basically putting away abandon and zoning during the closing shift so it's nice to have a larger chunk of aisles.

 

[lrou98]

Thanks for your replies. I don't understand why this a problem at my store. Maybe it is because of the 4 hour shifts at night. We must do research, clean, zone, reshop, backstock ( I understand that this is not to be done by beauty but it falls on deaf ears). To Anelmi, could you tell me how you get through all of this plus tacking on other aisles in a 4 hour shift? To IWishIKnew, you mentioned TMs....we are alone at night usually after 5 or 6. Do other stores have more than 1 tm on at night? The 35 aisles are always trashed as if no one has zoned in days. Stuff is constantly in the wrong places. We are expected to do a thorough zone, I wish we could do a quick zone. There are always 3-8 carts of push on 3 nights of the week. I've never stood around cooling my heels when we just had the beauty department to complete. I just cannot comprehend how other beauty tm's are handling this? I do the best I can but I get very anxious at closing time and things are not finished. I just need to know how to do all of this....I'm overwhelmed and trying to do the best I can. The other beauty Tms are feeling the same way with the same amount of hours at night. I appreciate your help and any tips. I'm sad that beauty has turned into this plus not having time to talk to guests.

 

[Hardlinesmaster]

@lrou98, try getting a few aisles super zone a day. Communicate with other beauty folks what you did. Do a fast zone while pushing auto pulls or reshop. Little things done can help you in the end. If you notice any areas that are empty, do a fast research on them. Replenishment will help sales for your team.

 

[Flow Warrior]

Beauty started out as beauty. Now we must take care of the entire health/pharmacy section plus a few extra aisles immediately after the beauty section. That comes to 35 aisles plus the backwall. Beauty is getting the shaft and it looks it as well. We have no time to do research, zone properly, talk with guests, clean, etc... I'm curious if the other beauty TM's out there are in beauty only or has your sections expanded over time? It's becoming frustrating...I loved being in beauty but now it has become a burden.

Because of the people who used to do HBA went to other locations, Our Beauty maintains beauty and HBA 1 . We have someone to do Pharm and someone to do HBA 2 so for Beauty its only 15. (7 valleys) we have 3 people to maintain 7 valleys. (found out that we lost one went I asked another why she was still working when I got off and she was working before I started my shift.)

 

[Anelmi]

All of the freight push, research, backstock is done by the day TM who has an 8 hour shift. I literally only zone and do reshop. Very rarely does the 4-5 hour closing TM do anything other than that at my store.

 

[IWishIKnew]

We usually only have one beauty TM after 5 or 6, but evening TM isn't expected to do backstock or research and usually don't do pulls.

A 4-hour shift including pulls, backstock AND research on top of zoning? No fucking way. That's ridiculous. Zoning can't even be done in 4 hours (we're a AA+ store, if that matters).

There are usually 2 beauty TMs during the day, and the closing beauty TM works 4-11 or so, if not an earlier start. Mid-day beauty usually leaves around 5, and unless the backroom was slow or something, pulls will be done by then and backstock is handled by the backroom team. They may need to do reshop if there is any, but that's not usually a lot.https://www.thebreakroom.org/#general.1

 

[beautygirldade]

In my store we have a set routine and an usual shift flow.

8am-3pm
10am-5pm
12pm-8pm (only on weekends for the demo table)
2pm-9pm
5pm-11pm

we have to push first thing in the morning, then back stock, scan outs, do manual batches throughout the day and just since last week we are expected to also take care of HBO2, so now we also have to drop, pull, push and back stock that. I guess it kinda makes sense since shampoos and all that its still kinda beauty, but now we are expected to do all of that and at the same time interact with the guests. Keep in mind that mine is a high volume store, and its kinda hard to spend 20 min with a single guest, building a relationship if you have the tl on your ass about hob push that needs to get done, or dusting on your zone.

just today I had a 2 hour training about building relationships wit the guests, when since the new pilot we have so many tasks that Ive had whole shifts where I don't get to talk to a single guest.

Idk what to do. my team is amazing and we work great together but I feel our Tls have no clue what they're doing, and the amount of tasks to get done takes away from the time we can spend with guests. Also, I have found that leadership at my store can't figure out what they want. I've had a team leader tell me to push and 10 min later another ask me why am I doing that. they want a different thing from you every time you talk to them, and its getting very confusing, we can't please everybody. and by the time I get to helping guests I'm either stressed about a leader that is time pressuring me into a task, or just so upset with the whole situation that I don't wanna build relationships I just wanna go on break. I really don't know what to do here. any suggestions?

 

[Pikachu Libre]

In my store we have a set routine and an usual shift flow.

8am-3pm
10am-5pm
12pm-8pm (only on weekends for the demo table)
2pm-9pm
5pm-11pm

we have to push first thing in the morning, then back stock, scan outs, do manual batches throughout the day and just since last week we are expected to also take care of HBO2, so now we also have to drop, pull, push and back stock that. I guess it kinda makes sense since shampoos and all that its still kinda beauty, but now we are expected to do all of that and at the same time interact with the guests. Keep in mind that mine is a high volume store, and its kinda hard to spend 20 min with a single guest, building a relationship if you have the tl on your ass about hob push that needs to get done, or dusting on your zone.

just today I had a 2 hour training about building relationships wit the guests, when since the new pilot we have so many tasks that Ive had whole shifts where I don't get to talk to a single guest.

Idk what to do. my team is amazing and we work great together but I feel our Tls have no clue what they're doing, and the amount of tasks to get done takes away from the time we can spend with guests. Also, I have found that leadership at my store can't figure out what they want. I've had a team leader tell me to push and 10 min later another ask me why am I doing that. they want a different thing from you every time you talk to them, and its getting very confusing, we can't please everybody. and by the time I get to helping guests I'm either stressed about a leader that is time pressuring me into a task, or just so upset with the whole situation that I don't wanna build relationships I just wanna go on break. I really don't know what to do here. any suggestions?

If you feel comfortable with your STL or any ETL not one of the ones stressing you out, could you sit down and have a serious talk with them? If they're good leadership they should want to set you up to succeed and not fail, and I'm sure they would love to know what obstacles are in the way of you being able to deliver great service on top of tasks.

 

[E2Eslave]

Honestly @beautygirldade I made the best decision to just simply get out of beauty. I do opu-pick and love it. Plus I get 38 hrs now per wk to do it. I'm free to do my wrk in peace interact with guests along the way peacefully without the pressure of beauty modernized expectations and micro management in the form of the new beauty tech. I used to love doing beauty it had structure a routine and the freedom to interact and help guests on our own free will cause we knew that was part of the job. Then the modernization happened. Along with that new management. Then the clipboard got introduced and the pressure to get attachments, the pressure to aggressively suggestive sell extra items to guests and then having to write it all dwn on the clipboard we needed to now carry in our cart. Not only that we have to write dwn yst sales, our today's sale goal and the comps. Plus our best seller in beauty and our worst. And the pressure to have to get guests to use the my checkout. And write that dwn too. And on top of that since i was the opener in a high volume store with low volume hrs at least in beauty was complete my push by 12 even though i started wrk at 7 but before i even start that i had to complete first impressions by filling endcaps front and back frm a1 to a16. Then complete the audit. Then wrk the autofill. Then start push. And stop to engage every guest and upsell whatever i can then go back to push. Then repeat til 12. Go to lunch then come back n do a manual audit cause that's part of my description for my shift. Not to mention my shifts got shorter which ended at 145. Same heavy workload with added extras but shorter time to complete it in. But guests first. Says the lil monkingbirds that never got off my shoulders. And on top of that i had to complete backstock by the end of my shift and my trash. All this by myself the mid wasnt scheduled til 2 the rare beauty tech spends his time more in electronics than beauty but like houdini he can vanish and appear at random from the opposite side of the store and be like how's beauty how many attachments did u get how many guests did u service. I'm like well here in this micromanaging clipboard u can see it took me 12 steps to reach the guest in need and it took me 5 min and 16 secs to tell the guest that the one item they came here for our store decided to clearance out and no longer carry and online said hell no aint here either so i spent an extra 3 min and 13 secs showing the guest a similar item but they said no thank u and it took me 24 steps to get back to my push now i have less than 1 hr to complete this never ending push. But beauty is beautiful. But the mid and closer got paid the same as me to not have to do anything but sell. So i found myself starting to feel more miserable in beauty and felt the extra .50 aint worth the pressure of feeling like my job depended on weather or not a guest bought any of my suggestions or used the my checkout. So getting out of that dept and into opu-pick was the best decision I made by far. I get fulltime hrs. Completely worth the change.

 

[beautygirldade]

@E2Eslave so what do you work now? We have a clipboard too and it sucks that on top of everything else we also have to know the ever changing numbers by heart. Are you working hardliners now? What do you think about soft lines? Cause I’m getting an average of 30 hrs a week and that’s just now enough. My TL has been pressuring me into training for softlines cause that’s “the only dept that has hours” but I always hear the poor softlines team members get yelled at in the Walkie and I just don’t really wanna be a part of that

 

[E2Eslave]

@beautygirldade I got asked if I would like to do backroom again by our new logistics etl or whatever new title he has now still aint used to those changes yet but logistics at our store has hrs unlike salesfloor which seem to have lil to no hrs for some reason. Even the e2e processes hrs got shorter n shorter ever since we got all new management. But i was averaging 25 to 30 hrs in beauty as the opener, before management change I averaged 35 to 38 per wk. I wasn't feeling the micro management changes so I took the offer to switch to backroom and they put me on flex. It's 38 hrs per wk. I actually really enjoy doing this more than beauty. I used to be instocks before being asked to do beauty when it first rolled out so finding stuff especially softlines comes natural since on hand counts are off or the sfq are of course wrong for certain items I have to pick in the flex order and sometimes its on hand counts with no backroom locations. But yea at my store beauty only has one opener, mid, and closer. The opener that they had replaced me with just put in her two wks cause she simply said she hates beauty that its way to much workload for her and the expectations are ridiculous. I guess she didn't understand what e2e really meant. No one really understands how much lil boxes come inside the bigger boxes and repacks. It's alot especially those nail polishes.

 

[queenofdaydreams]

omg yes, the NAILPOLISHES. 2 shrink wrapped together at a time that you have to rip open; plus a ton get broken in freight (i had THREE nail polishes spill on me today in a particularly large freight load).

question! everyone's talking about the "modernization" but i've only been working at target 3 months so i don't know any differently. what used to be different and what does modernization entail?

also oh no. clipboards?? what are those for? my store's beauty department doesn't have them yet but if you guys have them, we obviously will soon. they don't sound fun...

 

[RandomTeamMember]

omg yes, the NAILPOLISHES. 2 shrink wrapped together at a time that you have to rip open; plus a ton get broken in freight (i had THREE nail polishes spill on me today in a particularly large freight load).

question! everyone's talking about the "modernization" but i've only been working at target 3 months so i don't know any differently. what used to be different and what does modernization entail?

also oh no. clipboards?? what are those for? my store's beauty department doesn't have them yet but if you guys have them, we obviously will soon. they don't sound fun...

For opening up those stupid nail polish bottles I use a box cutter and cut a slit down the middle and across and they come out soooo much easier. Also for pushing a truck I highly recommended getting a pair of grippy gloves (I got a 3 pack from Amazon for around $12). Literally makes my job 10x better cuz you're hands aren't completely ruined by the end of the day and they allow you to open up things a lot easier. As far as clipboard, the only clip board we have is used to put out "sales sheet" on so we can easily write our sales down. Im also wondering what their talking about as far as modernization...