As I'm coming close to the end of my first retail job, I thought I'd write about retail. This field has a reputation for being not the best place to work at. The sucky hours. The rude customer at the register. The needy customer on the sales floor. The ones that don't care about where the product goes and think that the store will automatically be nicely organized and beautiful again the in the morning. Whenever you tell someone you work at retail, regardless of what store, they automatically connect to all of the above, because it's pretty much all the same.
But I'm not here to complain about my job experience at retail, instead, I want to thank retail for giving me the opportunity to grow and teach me life skills that I could not gain in a classroom. I started my first retail job last summer. I was desperate for a job at the time and was upset that most jobs need at least 1-2 years of customer experience because I believe I am a clean slate hard worker, and if you give me a chance I can prove it to you. But obviously, it's harder to believe when your resume lacks the capability.
Even though retail isn't my first job that summer, but it gave me a chance to not give up after the other places didn't work out as well as I hoped. Ulta Beauty in King of Prussia opened up that summer and were hiring for temporary task workers to help them open the store, I never thought I would be working this long at something that is supposed to be temporary. They took me in, they trained me, they treated me like family.
There are plenty of times where I don't want to go into work. Such as Wednesday after class shift till 9 at night, and I have to drive back to campus and start homework. Or the Monday morning shipment shift before class when I have to get up at 5:45 am to work then go to class. And there is obviously the Sunday morning hungover shift for me. But I made it to those shifts, some people might find it silly that I drive 20 mins to go to work for an 4 hours shift or a little amount of money, and when it's only retail, but I do it because commitment is important to me.
If you put in the effort, you will get something out of it (more than just the discount, even though the discount is literally life). I honestly believe that I wouldn't be the same person if I didn't have the opportunity of taking the job of Beauty Advisor at Ulta Beauty. It not only gave me something to put on a resume, which was my ultimate goal. However, I gained so much more, not only I learned about makeup and beauty products, but I also learned people skills, communication skills, organization skills, management skills, and the ins and outs of a retail business.
Retail might not be the best place to work for you, but it is a lot of people's income, and the people I worked with, I can truly see their passion about it in their eyes. And I'm grateful I was able to be a part of it, if only for a little time.
