Do you like working in retail?

[Nursemammato3]

I'm leaving nursing. What to do?
Thinking about retail.

I must admit I didn’t think people made a conscious decision to work in retail. I think it was a filler job with a lot of zero hours etc.

If you are choosing a direction and career for the rest of your life I’d be doing something that:

Leverages the training and knowledge is already invested in
Has as high a salary as possible or at least progression possibilities
Has job security
Suits my personality and how I envision my long term future

It depends where,
I worked in a independent shop run by a really nice couple, in a sort of market style place with shops around the edge. They sold art and decorations ad candles and things like that. And that was really fun, sensible hours, lovely community. I loved it there.

I also worked in a big fast fashion shop in a city center and that was awful.
I got screamed at so often by people trying to use expired vouchers or return items when they didn't have the tags, the reciept or the card they bought it on.
People crapped in the changing rooms at least once a week.
My role involved a lot of folding clothes into piles that people would then almost immediately tip over to grab their size and leave the clothes on the floor.
I got a written warning for not keeping the thong trays neat enough- because every single person who bought one would mess up the others in the tray.
Most customers were messy and rude and so angry.
My coworker had her nose broken when she got smacked in the face with a mannequin arm.
Wouldn't reccomend it there.

have you thought about working in a pharmacy? You’d have lots of transferable skills and if it’s boots you’d get a nice discount!

I used to work in retail
I would rather scrub toilets than have to work in retail again.
It's soul destroying.
You get treated like uneducated scum.

I adore it, more nice, friendly, funny people than not and a different day everyday but it’s minimum wage and I’ve no pension or anything really! Suits me but …

No. It’s bearable, if you have a decent boss/team and you can minimise customer interaction (I had a pretty good job doing stock work).

But otherwise it’s pretty shitty, you’re overworked, underpaid and treated like crap by customers.

I have a friend who is currently a volunteer retail worker in a charity shop. She is planning to leave this job once she gets a PT retail job elsewhere. She has worked in a number of different roles and she does not mind retail. She has told me that some days are hard because your busy and short staffed and some customers are rude and ignorant. Due to her own particular circumstances financially would suit her better to work PT.
She said that some retail jobs are nicer than others but generally it can be long hours and a min wage or a bit above min wage. My friend said as well that coming up towards Christmas it can get very busy. She would not advise anyone to take on retail work coming up to Xmas unless they had retail experience and knew how to work a till. Along with that some retail Christmas jobs are either very early starts or working the late's or odd hours here and their.

I know you are currently in nursing and you may want to leave because of the long hours and the fact it can be both a physical and mentally tough job. Rather than leaving just to work in retail would you consider doing further training to get into a different role such as a nurse in gp surgery. Would you consider doing phone work as a nurse answering questions in regards to health issues -like the nurse on call service that private health insurance companies have.

I think that your your nursing training and expertise you could get a job to make use of this and that would pay better than retail.
Would you go to a career guidance counselor and see what they suggest? I know it could cost you some money to do this but it could be money well spent.

I think if you looked into other options available it would be better for you. You could do extra training ect and make a plan that over the next few months you can leave where you are to get something better than retail.

Pros-

If you have a good team it can he a laugh.

You get to speak to/meet lots of people some of whom can be a laugh/interesting/lovely etc

Tips

Usually over time available

Its not as mind numbingly boring as the office jobs I've had. ( I'm talking about my experience if you have fun in the office good for you)

Weekends and /or evenings and/or nights available. Handy for fitting in around families.

Cons

Customers can be rude.

Short notice shifts

Rotas can vary from week to week which can make having a life difficult.

Having to fake an interest in what you are selling/promoting.

If your team sucks or is unreliable or lazy the work load can be unfairly distributed