Blinds to Go: Staffing a Retail Expansion (Essay Sample)

Blinds to Go: Staffing a Retail Expansion
Name
Institutional Affiliation
Date
Blinds to Go: Staffing a Retail Expansion
Concepts
Blinds to Go started in 1954 as a one man operation as a retail fabricator of window dressing. It was based on the key concept of quick delivery to the clients cutting the normal eight weeks delivery time to a mere 48 hours and at times a one-hour guarantee. The quick delivery was made possible by the fact that the factory was built next to the store. Conclusively the concept for Blinds to Go was to be both the manufacturers and retailers (Richard Ivey School of Business, 2001). The quality of staffing is also a concept of Blinds to Go. The senior management believed that the quality of the staff and the demographics that surrounded the customers were more important than the location of the store. The staff of Blinds to Go were trained to achieve first class staff talent. In addition, Blinds to Go had 100 percent commission base on their sales model, and its attention was on the customers’ needs.
Strategies
For the company to grow by 50% in sales and add, at least 50 stores per year across North America it developed strategies that would help achieve this goal. One of the Company’s strategies was to recruit talented staff especially after the decline in sales 1999.The declining sale forced the HR to develop a management team and trained staff to help increase Blinds To Go sales (Richard Ivey School of Business, 2001). Blinds to Go strategies also included the commission-based structure. The purpose of this strategy was to foster and enhance a sales hungry staff and culture and to reinforce high energy within the company. Creation of a healthy competitive environment within the store was another strategy of increasing Blinds to Go sales by 50% in sales. In this strategy, no rules were created for the staff when it came to grabbing customers.
Organizational Goals
Blinds To Go organizational goals involved the provision of satisfactory services to all its customers, avoidance of sale loss and being the best retailer and manufacturer of blinds in North America (Richard Ivey School of Business, 2001).. In addition to these goals, Blinds To Go ultimately wanted to increase their sales by 50% in the future and add 50 stores every year as a means of expanding the company. Some critical issues, however, hindered this expansion and growth strategy. Poor location of stores such as the East Mississauga store was a major contributor to 1999 declined sales. The location of the store made it vulnerable to cannibalization by another BTG store that was only 10 miles away. Another critical issue that affected BTG organizational goals was the recruitment of low-quality stuff that was of a low-class talent. The stores also had a maximum of four staff roles in a store this was an issue since the four staff roles were incapable of serving the growing number of BTG clients.
The HR system provided that the four staff roles were the store manager, the assistant store manager, selling supervisor and the selling associate. The function of the sales associates were to help walk in clients gets blinds. The selling supervisor’s functions were the candidates of the assistant anger whose function was to be in charge of the store while the manager was away. The compensation structure of the company that changed from full compensation to salary also hindered the attainment of BTG goals. In the process of this transformation as a way of attracting recruits, the staffs’ motivation declined to result in the decline in BTG sales.