How was everyones friends and family? How much further down was your store compared to last year?
13 replies (most recent on top)
I know no one will believe me and everyone will make comments like "drain the swamp" or whatever nonsense, but has anyone actually tried to see what sorts of points and then "freebies" they will get after they actually buy something. It is tough at first because you have to buy something first, but then you would be surprised how many points you get. I buy a lot, but I pay next to nothing for everything due to the points I get from my discount points as well as "surprise points."
@1sdt "Not like their is much to buy with little discount they give."
Especially since they now apply the F&F discount as a virtual coupon (instead of actually lowering the item prices in the system), which invalidates all other coupons and surprise points 'freecash' offers.
@1csc Damn you guys got it hard in your store thats insane to not even make half huge down right their.
35k on a plan of 82...so well worth staying open late.
I don't recall our sales, but I think we were down 8k vs last year. Once again another failed Friends and Family. Not like their is much to buy with little discount they give. Macy's and JCP had higher percentage off with better deals. We had crap deals overall. Another thing that kills us when they got rid of our discount a lot of workers in the store would buy in Family and Friends. I remember a bud of mine bought an expensive Fridge and said later on he would buy a stove. When he heard that the discount went bye bye he ended up purchasing it at Lowes. Nice move their Sears....
F&F has become a joke since they started having them every month. When they had three a year people looked forward to them & stores were busy after normal hours on Sunday. Now it's a waste of resources.
@vjw That is a shame. The older ladies do need the money normally and as you said they are loyal.
When we stay open late on Sundays it is just an excuse for the Operations Manager to give the people she favors extra hours at time and one half pay. Our state pays time and one half for working Sundays and she gives it all to the HS students that she wants to like her. Forget about the older ladies who could use the money and would clean up the store when it's slow. The kids stand at the registers on their phones or disappear for long on the clock breaks.
@efn No that wasn't a message from corporate. The associates at corporate understand what is going on in the stores and how not having ads affect the stores.
To quote a DM from Sears this morning "every Sears should have shown an increase for yesterday's Friends and Family event because last year's event was disappointing and did not meet expectations." Straight from the horses mouth and from corporate. We were down slightly from last year at our Sears store. Needless to say the DM wasn't thrilled.
Up 19% to last year
Didn't make goal ($12k below on about $30k) but was a busier than usual. Of course, it went off a cliff once we went past our normal store hours. It was certainly not worth it to stay open for three hours past closing time. Historically, it never was worth it for our store, however, we have to do it anyhow.
There was an event a few months ago that ended at normal closing hours and it worked out well. I don't know why we don't do sales like this again or at least run the hours longer for stores that have demonstrated its viability hour-by-hour, including the hours past normal operation.
Of course, maybe a little more effort in promoting the event may help. TV ads maybe?
Otherwise, staying open late regardless of sales performance after hours will just erode any profit that had been made during the busy hours earlier in the day.
This F&F was a joke! The store was dead all day. Prices where better yesterday.