This feature first appeared in Inside Retailing Magazine. Click here to subscribe.
Why fashion retailers are using professional training to turn sales staff into stylists.
By Jasmine Smith, managing editor, Inside Retailing Magazine
Chances are, just about everyone has at one time or another been sucked into buying a pair of pants they were assured looked “fantastic” on them, but actually made them look about as attractive as a sack of spuds.
Personalisation is currently one of the biggest customer-driven trends in retail and in fashion retail, this is translating to a demand for individual styling advice.
The popularity of television shows such as What Not To Wear, featuring UK style queens, Trinny Woodhall and Susannah Constantine, and American program Queer Eye for the Straight Guy highlights how fashion conscious customers today are, and how highly prized expert styling advice is. This is particularly true for the busy, time-poor customer. They want an honest appraisal of what suits them, what doesn’t and if you can put together a whole outfit for them – all the better.
“I think a lot of self esteem issues are wrapped up into what you wear and how you feel, and women are particularly affected by it. So, I feel if you can connect with your customer on the right level and be honest with them and give them real styling advice, it results in better sales,” says CEO of Corporate Training Australia, Tanya Hamersfeld.
“Women tend to go through transitional phases in their lives, whether they’re dating, or have just had a baby, or their bodies are changing. When they go into fashion stores, sometimes that gets overlooked and it becomes just transactional.”
She says CTA’s styling course for retailers has experienced an unprecedented surge in popularity over the past year (it was introduced five years ago), with clients like Armani Exchange, Review, Events, Myer, Metalicus, Zelus, Dangerfield and Allannah Hill benefiting from a 10 to 23% increase in sales, driven by higher conversion rates.
“What we’re trying to do is bring back the experience to the stores and have people actually interact with customers in a meaningful way. We teach participants how to assess people based on their body shape and assist them in dressing to enhance their good bits and hide their not-so-good bits.
“We also teach people how to dress for their complexion and style – the different colours and different fabrics that suit them.”
Groups are kept to a maximum of 15. “We do syndicate groups of five and we get the trainer to dress in different styles that don’t suit her and styles that do suit her. People get so much more out of the learning experience when people are given a chance to present back to the group. So, if the group gets too big it’s unmanageable.”
Inspiring style
Hamersfeld describes CTA’s team of 20 style trainers – all women – as ‘self confessed fashionistas’. “They inevitably spend more on fashion than they earn as trainers! Some are ex comedians, singers or presenters, so they’re full of life and lots of fun.
“All of our stylists are women who have retail fashion backgrounds. One of them is a fashion commentator for Melbourne Cup Day’s ‘fashion on the fields’ for Channel 7.”
A major benefit of teaching fashion sales staff how to style is stimulating a bit of motivation and inspiration within the team by offering employees skills that are clearly valuable and relevant, Hamersfeld explains.
“If you’ve had a career in retail, you could go through sales training many, many times. But if you go through a fashion styling program where they say ‘the reason Beyoncé looks so good even though she’s got curves, is because she wears things that balance her out’, all of a sudden it’s got a different focus and it feels like something you want to learn, because you could style your mother or your cousin or help yourself to wear pants that flatter you more.
“It enriches the experience for the sales assistant as well. They’re actually noticing their customer and learning how to engage them on a more meaningful level than just saying ‘so what’s the weather like outside?’
“It’s much better for them to approach a customer saying, ‘haven’t you got lovely broad shoulders – you know what would look good on you? There’s the latest season’s trend that really works well for someone with broader shoulders and I think you should try this dress, and this is probably your size’.
“That makes it so much more targeted and meaningful.”
Hamersfeld says the styling skills of Australian retail staff are only just beginning to catch up to other countries.
“I just got back from New York and it’s almost like they’re a bit ahead of us. And I know we have a cultural cringe against Americans so we don’t like to admit that. When I was in the stores, I had people saying to me, ‘look those pants aren’t going to fit you, you’re a different size and you should try these ones’. And that’s really helpful because at the end of the day if I leave with something that flatters me, I’m going to feel good about that experience and I’m going to want to go back.”
My store, my stylist
Myer began working with CTA almost two years ago and around 7000 of the company’s fashion team members will have completed the Selling With Confidence fashion stylist course by the end of August 2007.
This includes store team members from women’s and men’s wear, fashion accessories, footwear and youth areas.
Myer Recruitment and Training Manager Noelene Blair told Inside Retailing Magazine the program is effective because it links traditional sales training to the current season’s fashion products and focuses on presenting a total solution that meets each customer’s individual needs.
“Team members have found the program inspires them to experiment with products to provide a total solution to customers. It increases their confidence and competence and they find this very empowering,” she says.
“It was just what they needed to help pull all their knowledge together and enable them to sell new season merchandise effectively in a way that meets our customers’ needs and expectations.”
She says under its new ownership, Myer has moved away from generic retail skills training in favour of more job-specific programs like Selling With Confidence, as well as structured development programs such as Management Development and Graduate programs for those who meet selection criteria and have the potential to develop into a future leader within the company.
“We have been able to make our training design and delivery much more specific to the fast moving department store environment.”
Blair says Myer has built an internal structure to support recruitment and training, and that all training is now developed and delivered by highly skilled, passionate internal training officers, some of which had themselves been trained by CTA.
“We can now be much more responsive to changing market needs and can quickly tailor training to address opportunities in the marketplace.”
Suzy Whyte, NSW and Qld state manager for young women’s fashion retailer Review says all the company’s full timers, store managers and assistant managers are offered the chance to complete a TAFE-recognised retail certificate, which includes the CTA styling course as one of the modules.
“All up, about 60 to 70 staff are currently undertaking the certificate.”
She says the results Review expects from the styling course are more to do with customers and staff than the bottom line.
“Our focus is on styling our customer more than on making the sale. We wanted to focus more on getting repeat clientele and making our customers happy.
“Straight away we’ve noticed a huge increase in enthusiasm towards retail and their roles. Sometimes you find girls have a preconceived idea of what it is to work in retail and that’s what we’re trying to change. We’ve already seen a huge lift in morale. “They’re feeling more challenged.
“With the new generation, making retail a fun and interesting career is really important, which is why we introduced (professional training).
“The new generation coming through expects to get something out of every role so it’s really important to be an employment destination. That’s what we’re hoping to achieve – being an employee of choice.
“We’re just hoping to keep improving things here – keep the girls on their toes, keep them motivated and give them a greater understanding of the retail industry in general and the business side of things, rather than just working on the shopfloor.”
Hamersfeld says CTA’s retail clients generally have clear expectations of the outcomes of the styling course.
“Some clients even set KPIs for us and if we don’t achieve an increase in sales, for example, they don’t renew our contract. We’ve got contracts spanning over five years, so there’s definitely evidence to support that there is an increase.
“Some of them will report it to us, but we sign confidentiality agreements about those figures.”
With styling advice so in demand, CTA also just begun to offer a fashion styling course to the public. “We have people who come in off the street who want to update their look but may not have a huge budget.”
Hamersfeld says the course is entirely independent and doesn’t push any particular retailer’s clothes, but gives advice on general styling and trends.
“One of the trends of the last season was the oversize bag, but if a woman is petite then an oversize bag can completely overshadow her.
“So we talk about proportions and dimensions and help them update their wardrobe with a few key trend pieces that aren’t going to swamp them and that actually suit their style. We do that from our Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide offices, and we do it over a glass of champagne, which is very civilised.”