🚀 go-pugleaf

[nostalgia about stupid Radio Shack (salesmen), and TRS-80's deleted]

Ah, Radio Shack, let me tell you about Radio Shack.  You see, my wife
manages one, and I worked at one as a second job while trying to save up
money to buy our first house.

Point 1 -- 95% of the salesmakers, as they are called, are totally
ignorant regarding the products they sell -- don't know how to hook up a
VCR, program the 6-disk changer CD player, don't know a 1ohm resistor
from a 1Kohm, can't run a DOS machine, etc.  The worst I have seen
personally is when a salesmaker (whom I didn't like in the first place,
since I knew he was stupid) told a potential customer that the
Tandy 1000 TL/2 (80286 based 640K DOS machine) ran _MacIntosh_ software!!!! His explanation was that they both use the same floppy size, ergo...

Point 2 -- Point 1 comes about because those people who are too stupid
to know their products, are the same people who are too stupid to know
that they are being shafted by the corporation.  Bluntly, Tandy
corporate policy is fucked-up!
 
   When my wife took over her store, she found that there was a $6000
inventory loss, which the corporation was going to hold her responsible
for! Day one, she comes in and does an inventory, $6000 of stuff is
missing, and its her fault??

   Salesmakers earm hourly ($3.50) or 6.5% commission, whichever is
higher; except between Thanksgiving and New Year's, when the commission
is dropped to 5.5%.  Corporate says that lots of sales are "unearned"
during this time.  
 
   Managers make 3.5% commission on everything the sell, provided they
average more than $75 per hour, and they only get commision on the
dollar amount over $75. The rate drops to 2.5% during the golden
quarter.  Also, managers are not supposed to be salesmakers.  What this
leads to is salesslime making more than the manager -- purely as a
result of corporate policy!
  
   My wife recently tried to get some more sales help. To do so she had
to request her "team leader" approval. The team leader has to get the
district manager's approval.  The district manager has to request from
corporate HQ in Fort Worth, TX, that an ad be placed in our local paper.
Corporate HQ may or may not do this.  Luckily it was done, turnaround of
10 days or so from first call to seeing the ad.  When someone came in
that my wife interviewed and felt would be good, she had to send them
off to the team leader for another interview.  If the team leader
accepts the person, they go off to the distric manager for a final
interview!!  Talk about centralized control.

   Most recently, corporate had an employee bonus deal where we could
buy a computer, 20M hard drive, and EGA monitor at "cost". Pretty good
deal, and lots of employees responded.  To get a computer you filled out
the form, and mailed it to corporate HQ. They eventually UPS'd the unit
directly to you.  The catch here is that the cost of all warranty work
is charged to the store you were working at when you bought your
computer (which eventually comes out of teh manager's paycheck).  What
happened? Right, one of her employees got one, and his hard disk was
broke $399 replacement cost to evetually come out of my wifes pocket.
Did she have any control over this? Did she get any commision from the
sale? Of course not! But something goes wrong and it must be her fault.

   A company which deals in computers didn't have computerized inventory
control or point-of-sale terminals until THIS FALL.  Corporate liked
pencil and paper wasting time, I guess.  Then the FINALLY figured out
that it cost $$$$$$ to waste that time!

   One last thing.  Forty percent of the manager's commisions earned are
held back until the end of teh fiscal year and are forfeited if the
manager is not with the company at the end of the fiscal year.  This is
the reason my wife is still there -- we can't afford to have her walk
away from $3000 in held back commisions.

So next time you have to buy something from RS, and are amazed at the
stupidity of the salesperson, you'll know that all the good ones quit
out of frustration.
-- 

'I just couldn't convince the voters that Dukakis was Greek for
"Bubba".' -- Lloyd Benson explaining why the Democrats didn't carry
Texas