From yesterday’s comments to JAY REIDER who asked, “Does management even know how to run that store!”
I would have to reply that no, they don’t. Or at least, something is seriously lacking in their hiring and other stuff. I’ve been there for 16 years now. The first couple years I was there, we had enough people to run the garden center – at least 4 full time and a couple part time people. But, little by little, they retired or transferred to different stores until I was the only one left. And when that happened, I used to ask when we were going to get more people hired to work in the garden center. They’d always tell me that they were trying, but for one reason or another, we never got good help. When they did hire someone to work out there, it was always the wrong type of person – people who thought garden center was a simple job, where all you had to do was stand around squirting water on plants. And then they didn’t know how to do that, either. One kid (I call all the people in their 20’s or under “kids”) told me that he had already watered the plants I was watering. I told him that’s not what the plants were telling me. They were bone dry. The kid (I don’t remember his name) said that of course the leaves were dry because it was hot and sunny out. I informed him that I don’t mind that the leaves were dry – what I was upset about was how dry the soil was. And they were always putting people out there who knew nothing about plants. If a customer asked if we had clematis plants, they should be able to say yes or no (right now, it’s no), rather than giving the customer a blank stare and asking “what’s a clematis plant?” And then there was the guy, Tremain who would hose down the concrete in the patio area at least 3 times a day to wash the dirt off. When I told him I needed the hose to water the plants, he said, “This is important too.” No it wasn’t!!! And managers knew he was wasting time on that but they did nothing about it. (more coming)
From yesterday’s comments to JAY REIDER who asked, “Does management even know how to run that store!”
I would have to reply that no, they don’t. Or at least, something is seriously lacking in their hiring and other stuff. I’ve been there for 16 years now. The first couple years I was there, we had enough people to run the garden center – at least 4 full time and a couple part time people. But, little by little, they retired or transferred to different stores until I was the only one left. And when that happened, I used to ask when we were going to get more people hired to work in the garden center. They’d always tell me that they were trying, but for one reason or another, we never got good help. When they did hire someone to work out there, it was always the wrong type of person – people who thought garden center was a simple job, where all you had to do was stand around squirting water on plants. And then they didn’t know how to do that, either. One kid (I call all the people in their 20’s or under “kids”) told me that he had already watered the plants I was watering. I told him that’s not what the plants were telling me. They were bone dry. The kid (I don’t remember his name) said that of course the leaves were dry because it was hot and sunny out. I informed him that I don’t mind that the leaves were dry – what I was upset about was how dry the soil was. And they were always putting people out there who knew nothing about plants. If a customer asked if we had clematis plants, they should be able to say yes or no (right now, it’s no), rather than giving the customer a blank stare and asking “what’s a clematis plant?” And then there was the guy, Tremain who would hose down the concrete in the patio area at least 3 times a day to wash the dirt off. When I told him I needed the hose to water the plants, he said, “This is important too.” No it wasn’t!!! And managers knew he was wasting time on that but they did nothing about it. (more coming)