I'm not defending our leadership, but judging by the posts here, everyone thinks it's easy to manage a company. Perhaps someone knows a strategy that would help fix this place? I don't want to sound provocative, I'm really interested in what you think, is there anything that would help Belk get back on track.
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Honestly you have to care about something besides lieing and cheating the people. The customers don't care about some pat answer as to why they can't find a register open in half the store. They just want to check out. The aggressive business practices do not work on a customer level or an associate level. Belk and Sycamore are banking on the fact that people are stupid but not all people are. You can only ignore so much. Combined with the messy stores, associates complaining at every register, inferior merchandise ,downright toxic environment and RVP's swooping in to practice total denial obervations of the store. I would say they would have change their whole business plan. Not going to happen!
Get rid of useless RVP’S and group vp belk has too many layers of upper management
Here’s a tip to help business
- fire Don Hendricks
- Have sycamore investigated by the feds Maybe raid their office
- Restore all belk stores to the way they were before sicko took over
- Pay all full fine employees a living wage
- Get rid of nasty, rude, crooked management most of which worked And was fired from Macy’s and sleezed their way into belk
- Get and identity and merchandise people want!
- Get better brands! Improve vendor relations!
- Fire snaggletoof
And there you have it, a definitive way to improve business!
Have you heard of the phrase The Fish is rotten at the top! Belk is not going to change and nothing is going to make any difference at all when the same leaderships at the top refuse to listen and do what is right for Belk and the loyal Belk workers. Forget about the detail and how to run 300 Belk stores today. We did not get Belk into $2 billion in debts overnight. It is the sad Belk CEOs like Lisa Harper, Nir Patel and Don Hendricks have destroyed this once great retail company Belk name and legacy! Replace the stinking fishes at the top and then let us talk about if Belk will survive next year!
Nowadays it all about merchandising and fulfillment, it’s new reality and business has to be adjusted to it. Could be nice to have old fashion “sales person “ with individual approach to every customer, but it’s just unaffordable at this time.
This is what would make sense to me in a bigger store. Cosmetics and jewelry need their counters, everything else should have centralised checkout. Increase amount of merchandisers, have a consistent one in every department, and you will have so much more efficient fulfilment operation.
Replace half of managers by hourly key holders. You need a store manager and 2 assistants, so there will be at least one full authority manager in busiest time every day. Opening and closing should be held by key holders. You don’t have to spend extra money, you just need to restructure existing model.
They have 291 stores when they filled for bankruptcy and only closed 1 store. The only reason it was closed is because the shopping center was bought out. You have to close under performing stores, adjust hours to when you have shoppers in the stores. Reward your staff and not with a $4 per person pizza party. Close down for Thanksgiving including fulfillment. Close early on Major holidays. You have to Appreciate your works because they are your front line to the customers. Staff your stores for a true customer service. Boutiques have this down most have the owner in there working with staff they give service. Find your identity and stick with it. The pandemic changed a lot of things but they need to decide if we are a department store or a closeout store.
I am in management and Belk could survive if they would change their return policy to 30 days with receipt or credit card. No lowest price given on a gift card for stolen or worn items. Train people with this rule company wide and they will save their receipts and respect the return policy. Also don’t change coupons and sales daily. Belk needs to follow expirations on rewards and all coupons and not override them to make customers happy. Rules need to be followed or it will all fall. Stop overriding because you are worried about losing that customer. You will also keep employees when they have rules to follow and know what to do on every transaction. Employees stay confused and leave instead of figuring it all out.