Career profile: Retail Operative

What does a Retail Operative do?

I came to Eden to be a shop assistant, using the tills as summer cover. Then they found out that I can sell and made me the Eden shops personal shopper. I love the public and could sell fridges to Eskimos! I give tours of the shop and can tell the story behind all the products, where they are made and where the materials came from and so on. This enhances the visitors experience by making their shop visit more exciting and sharing the journey their products have taken to find them.

I spend most of the summer at the front door of the shop, meeting, greeting and pointing people in the right direction and selling Todka (Toffee Vodka) and musical instruments. When people come into the shop they need to feel excited and comfortable and are usually exhausted from walking up the path. Our challenge is to make them think the shop is great. This is important because they end their day in the shop and it is their last impression of Eden.

On top of these things I have my normal shop assistant duties such as working on the tills and cleaning. We work a lot as a team and all pitch in together. Each of us has our own sections to keep clean and look after and I am more than happy to go off and scrub the floors when required.

Do you enjoy your role?

I absolutely love it! Joining Eden was like a whole new change of life for me and when I first came here I couldn’t believe what it was like. I enjoy communicating with the public more than anything else and just love talking to them and selling them things and generally making sure they are having a good day. I have found that I am good at diffusing them if they are a bit cross about something and can make sure they leave happy.

Since I have been at the front of the shop I have been counting the nationalities of the people I have spoken to. So far I have counted 35 different nationalities, which is amazing! Where else would you get to talk to people from 35 different countries?

We have a brilliant team in Retail and have a good Retail Manager. If you have a problem it is very easy to find someone who will listen.

What do you like most about working for Eden?

The people! The people who work here make such a difference and there is a great camaraderie around the site. I am almost 60 now and I can have fun with the 18-20 year olds and everybody is treated the same. You could build an Eden somewhere else but you could never capture the magic that we have here simply because of the team. I think you have to be a very special person to work here and you have to be something different.

I have discovered things about myself working here, that it has taken me a lifetime to discover. It is difficult to explain but I have found a way with people that I never knew I had and which has blossomed. I think this is down to the management allowing you to be what you want to be. If you have a skill Eden seems to bring it out and encourage you to go off and use it.

Tell us a bit about your background prior to joining Eden…

I ran my own local pet shop for 30 years, so have always been into retailing. We brought up four children and decided to sell the pet shop two or three years ago. I thought about retirement, but after three months sitting around not doing much I got bored and decided I wasn’t ready to retire. My daughter worked here and had grown up with Eden, so I have always known about what was going on here. I saw my job advertised in the paper and decided to go for it, just to see what happened. When I got the job on a zero hours contract and began work that summer I absolutely loved it and couldn’t believe how wonderful it was to be here.