Merchandising

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NARMS has lists of available merchandising jobs. Google them. I can't remember the site. Marketforce has some under their blue portal, but it's a shot in the dark with those.
Love - merchandising can be a lot of things from demo work to product reps. What are you looking to do? I work and have worked with several.

~~*~~*~~*~~ kal ~~*~~*~~*~~
Everyone has a photographic memory. Some just forget to load the film.
I am interested in product reps. I worked in a deptment store and enjoyed fixing the deptments, and putting new stock out. However I am retired now and don't want a full time job. I appreciate your help.
LOVE LOVE LOVE merchandising. Much more than MSing. Like MSing, there are good and bad companies. Narms.com is a great place to find work. I've done Rite Aid merchandising on a monthly basis and had a route of locations. I had several clients for them. Go in, straighten up, order merchandise, inflate balloons. Go home, enter a QUICK report and wait for my fat check to arrive. smiling smiley I've done Office Max and Office Depot on a regular basis like that, too. I've done huge resets at Home Depot and Lowes and got offered a full-time job by the manager. LOVED them but I can't lift anything heavy due to a car accident so I have to pass when I see them now. sad smiley I've gotten paid hourly or by the job, as an employee with tax withheld or an IC where I'm responsible. I've gotten paid for mileage as a regular part of the job and not. I've also added in a BK shop to get a free lunch for my day routes.

There used to be a number of USER FRIENDLY merchandising forums but I think they've gone the way of the dinosaur. I think the V horror site has a merchandising forum.
Everyone has been so helpful! I am so glad I joined Mystery Shop Forum. Thanks to all!
I like merchandising work because of the regular pay and flexible hours. I mystery shop around my merchandising schedule.

I started with Certified, which is now the Marketforce Purple site to learn and get started in the field. I only take these jobs now if they are bonuses. Their starting rate does not pay enough to cover the cost of printing, reading, and understanding 20-50 pages of instructions, gas, in store time, and reporting time.

I found that I got better training and support from companies where I was an employee. The companies I work for pay for all of my time, in store, drive time, prep time in home reading instructions, and taking test.

Companies I like are ASM, Actionlink, and Mosaic.
i have worked for Lawrence Merchandising for 3 years now. I love working for them, and LOVE my boss. I can highly reccomend them.

~~~~*~~~~~*~~~~~*~~~~~*~~~~~*~~~~~*~~~~~*~~~~~*~~~~~*~~~~~*~~~~~* Shoppin' Mama of 4 lovely & unique girls and Nana to Bella, Delilah and Lincoln, shopping in Oregon and parts of Washington
What is a "fair" hourly wage for demos and merchandising? I did merch with my old job years ago.

MissChele - Shopping KY, IN & OH
Thread Killer
AlwaysAngie Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> LOVE LOVE LOVE merchandising. Much more than
> MSing. Like MSing, there are good and bad
> companies. Narms.com is a great place to find
> work. I've done Rite Aid merchandising on a
> monthly basis and had a route of locations. I had
> several clients for them. Go in, straighten up,
> order merchandise, inflate balloons. Go home,
> enter a QUICK report and wait for my fat check to
> arrive. smiling smiley I've done Office Max and Office Depot
> on a regular basis like that, too. I've done huge
> resets at Home Depot and Lowes and got offered a
> full-time job by the manager. LOVED them but I
> can't lift anything heavy due to a car accident so
> I have to pass when I see them now. sad smiley I've gotten
> paid hourly or by the job, as an employee with tax
> withheld or an IC where I'm responsible. I've
> gotten paid for mileage as a regular part of the
> job and not. I've also added in a BK shop to get a
> free lunch for my day routes.
>
> There used to be a number of USER FRIENDLY
> merchandising forums but I think they've gone the
> way of the dinosaur. I think the V horror site has
> a merchandising forum.

Always Angie I need to network with you. Direct me to your private virtual message office, please. Thanks.
Jaosmom Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> i have worked for Lawrence Merchandising for 3
> years now. I love working for them, and LOVE my
> boss. I can highly reccomend them.

I need to step into your virtual private msg office, too. I need h e l p and a mentor.
[merchandising.proboards.com]

Feel free to sign up and join in! Jacob said I could post the link..... thanks, Jacob. There will be soon be a merchandising thread here.
I've been considering working for Brand X doing merchandising jobs. Here's how Brand X works, as far as I can tell. They pay by the hour, but the job has a cap for the number of minutes you have to do it. To me, that means if I'm slow or new on that job, I eat the overage above the allowed time. It also means, to me, that as I learn and get better and better, that I do the job faster and faster and I get paid less and less, kind of like Chinese undertime as opposed to Chinese overtime. I don't get paid any mileage within a 20 miles radius of home, no matter how many jobs I do or how long I drive to and from jobs. I just get the hour pay for the minutes I report on each job, up to what is considered the maximum time I should be there. So I'm looking at spending time learning a whole new program on the website so I can get these jobs and report them and fill out payroll forms, and as I get better and better I'll make less and less.

All you merchandisers out there, is this how this is supposed to work, or am I once again having a difficult senior moment?

Or have I just started with the wrong company and I need to look around more?

Mary Davis Nowell. Based close to Fort Worth. Shopping Interstate 20 east and west, Interstate 35 north and south.
All the merchandising companies I work for do give a time, but it was always generous. If you finish early (and95%of the time you finish early) you are done. If you run out of time you either call for more time or leave it for the store employees to finish or your next visit.

But as for Brand X - that is not how I work. I am assigned a territory in a 10-15 mile area. I have several department stores and specialty stores in that territory. One day I will do store A - men's dress slacks. Duties include checking racks, resizing, folding and stacking, resetting a few pairs correctly on hangers. Move some back stock to racks, verify current signing and pricing and check with store manager for issues. Total allotted 1:30. Total time it takes about 40 -50 min. I may have a second assignment in the same store verifying luggage is out and looks pretty. This job may have an hour and it takes me 35 minutes. Total time in store less than 1.5 hours. Bill 2.5. The next day I may have a coffee pot display set up in three different stores. Each one takes about 10 minutes and they are allocated an hour each.

Only once did I go overtime. I called and got extra time because I couldn't set the product to plan-o-gram because the store did not hav the correct fixtures. Called and got more time.

Another company has a fixture in two stores. Twice a week I go to make the fixture look pretty an put out back stock. Total time 15 minutes and hour charge each. Once a month do inventory and charge an extra hour.

All companies are different. I've seen people travel great distances to service one product in dozens of stores. That's not for me. I don't travel more than 15 minutes from home and squeeze in shops along the way.

Hope this helps.

~~*~~*~~*~~ kal ~~*~~*~~*~~
Everyone has a photographic memory. Some just forget to load the film.
MSDavisnowell - just curious. why wouldn't you get paid mileage?

~~*~~*~~*~~ kal ~~*~~*~~*~~
Everyone has a photographic memory. Some just forget to load the film.
MDavisnowell "They pay by the hour, but the job has a cap for the number of minutes you have to do it"

Don't be afraid to ask the company to clarify. If it is MF you are paid the hourly wage even if it takes 20 min. Then they pay a certain amount per quarter hour after the first hour. If you don't have competition you may be able to get a higher starting rate.

You will find companies that you like and some that you hate. Some have regular schedules and others have work for me once in a blue moon. Pay and mileage varies. Test the water, if you don't like the temp move on to another.
kalfini and glute - Not MF. Thanks for responding. I'm going to work some more on trying to figure out if I'm understanding the deal.

Because with this particular company I would be an employee with wages reported on W2, IRS rules prevent them from claiming mileage expenses for mileage to the first location worked and home from the last location. As an employee, I could claim and deduct mileage driven between the first location and all the way to the last location, but not to the first location and home from the last location. That is the way IRS has it set up, and I'm pretty sure I'm not going to get reimbursed by the company if they can't claim the expense. No where on the website and in the training they have sent me do I see anything about being paid mileage, but after I take one more look I'll send an email.

What made me think I would only get paid for minutes worked is the fact that I don't get paid ANYTHING for minutes over the capped minutes, and my understanding is I have to report the exact minutes in the location. This is what made me think they weren't going to pay for total capped minutes but only for actual on site minutes. I may be wrong, and I'm going to check that out, too.

I think I'm looking at a deal that pays $X per hour for minutes on site and that's all. I can't see how that would work very well for me at a few minutes here and a few minutes there, while I'm round and about all day and lose over half the possible mileage deduction because I'm on a W2. I would be working only close to home, within a 20 mile range.

I know I'm probably not understanding this, and thanks for your input.

Mary Davis Nowell. Based close to Fort Worth. Shopping Interstate 20 east and west, Interstate 35 north and south.
You should still be able to claim mileage, though not to the first or last job. The company can still pay you for your mileage, even as an employee. One of my companies did. Then they use that expense as a write-off for themselves. If you're paid for mileage, then, as you know, you can't claim them for yourself.

I'm with Kalfini on this one. I got paid the time stated whether I was there for 20 minutes or an hour. I rarely went over the alloted time given.
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