Who is doing the $6 Certified merchandising jobs?

February 11, 2009 12:08AM

is anyone here doing the $6 merchandising jobs that Certified has up for the huge discount department store?

I just don't understand how it is worth $6 to even get out of my car, let alone locate back stock, speak to store staff, and set up.

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February 11, 2009 04:43PM

And it is especially not worth it considering that rude company!

February 11, 2009 07:25PM

I agree with SusanMB and Angellique it is just not worth it. I wonder if they Think about what they are asking us to do as shoppers. They act like all of us shoppers should be happy with what they are paying, but we are not and I think. That need to rethink before asking shoppers to work for that price. Certified merchandising jobs are the pits, and I do not care if they ever send me any Shopping listings I would not be hurt at all they are very rude also. I hope that Everyone can see just what they are about which is nothing.

February 11, 2009 08:51PM

My favorite job from them was an appliance "audit". They paid $8 and it was putting new Energy Star stickers on certain fridge models, and handing the new specs to the department manager. I only took them because they were small "mom & pop" type appliance stores, not BIG companies, and they were right in the area of bank shops that I was doing those days. Turned out every one of the stores I went into did not carry the model that I was to change the sticker on, and they had alrady recevied the new marketing materials from the company that made the fridge. All I had to do was walk in, say hello, give them the materials, have them sign off and leave. Since they were small stores, it was a very quick and pleasant experience.

Any other job I've done for them has been a nightmare. I don't get the materials on time, they send me the wrong materials, if I send a question I don't get a reply in time to do the job, or they pay less than $10 and expect hoop jumping.

UGH. *SIGH*

February 12, 2009 02:41AM

I pass on the $6 jobs. Not able to justify it.

February 12, 2009 02:16PM

I was actually looking at a $8 one. Go to store. Check out the stock. Restock the shelf. Leave. They list it as ongoing....every couple weeks.

Looked simple enough, but is there something I'm missing??
It said, takes aprox 30 min.......$8 for the first hour and $2 for each 15 min.

I have 3-4 stores near me that need the help, I aready figured it would take me a couple hours to hit 2-3 of these stores.

However, how do "ongoing" jobs work?? How do you take vacations or time off if you need to??

February 12, 2009 02:38PM

The only problem I forsee is when you get to the store, you will have to track down the right person to be in the stockroom, and then locate the product. You'll then get to the area and put the product up, then have to figure out where they want the old product, and then get signatures. It's sounds easy enough and the actual product work will take you 30 minutes, but all of the searching around takes time. You will be there an hour and make $8, which is just not worth it in my opinion.

Part of the problem for me is that I live in Metro NJ, where the cost of living is not the same as many other parts of the country. It's expensive to live here and I can't do a job for $8 when I can do a bank shop in the same amount of time (plus the report of course) and receive double the money.

February 12, 2009 09:55PM

Lower paying shops, built into a route, can help fatten a day's pay. But, the low-paying shop needs to be short and sweet.

February 13, 2009 03:46AM

I could not build a route with their shops. I tried but it always ended up with a date change so I could not do the shops with anything else. The towns were they wanted me to cover were small and 25-30 miles from me. I did it for about two months and ended bing in the hole big time so I had to just get out of it. They were always nice but it just did not work. The most fun and the most money, because I could fit it anywhere, was counting steps across stores. Easy in and out and down the road to another one.

February 13, 2009 03:57AM

I've not encountered the counting steps, Deech. I can count and step at the same time, so it could work for me, too! Could you offer any hints on client and/or MSP?

February 14, 2009 12:52AM

Mert Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I've not encountered the counting steps, Deech. I
> can count and step at the same time, so it could
> work for me, too! Could you offer any hints on
> client and/or MSP?

I am pretty sure it was Certified in late winter or early spring. I got a new computer in July and they are not in my computer files since I stopped merchandising for them. Let me look back at my paper trail and I will let you know who, when and where.

The only thing I could figure was, for whatever reason, they were trying to verify or determine the size of small, medium and large stores by stepping off the length and width. They also wanted to know the number of registers. Quick in and out for around $8. It was a good deal if they run it again. I will get back to you shortly.

February 14, 2009 01:07AM

Sounds more like something a competitor would do as certainly the store owner would know the size of the facilities.

February 14, 2009 05:09AM

I did 10 of the counting steps ones last spring. VERY easy pay. 5 minutes to report. I only do those kind of shops for them-meaning, 10 minutes time. Or ones that I get a free movie for 2 plus concession treats with a 5 minutes report. I never do anything else. And I have always been paid on time, treatly nicely, and never had any issues with saying no, which I say more often than not. But I am very choosy about the work I do for them.

**********************************************************************
“Lying in bed would be an altogether perfect and supreme experience if only one had a colored pencil long enough to draw on the ceiling."
~Gilbert K. Chesterton

February 14, 2009 06:05AM

Am I glad someone else counted steps besides me. I was beginning to think I was the only one. It was fun and easy but it did not last very long. I did about 15 and signed up for 10 more and they pulled them all of a sudden. I never did see any more.

I did auto parts and grocery stores. The grocery stores were national chains and others were small town (500-700) local stores.

February 14, 2009 02:09PM

Now THAT I would do for $8 if I was going right by or could get a grouping of them for $8. I don't think it's as easy as my appliance store though! But that was serendipity. I had no idea they would be that easy. I wish I had seen that one. I agree that it sounds like a competitor was trying to gauge the size of a store.

I have had the same thing happen with date changes and cancellations, which is not only annoying if you are trying to build a "route" but how I got dropped from Market Force. I built up a route using their cheap shops, and when Certified dropped their jobs, changed the date, or didn't get the marketing materials to me on time, Market Force didn't give a sh** that their other company was the reason for my issues. I just could not drive 30 miles to make $10. That was when I vowed to never take a cheap shop again and run around like crazy for these companies. How much are their CEO's making thanks to the cheap shops??

And yes, I am bitter from this!

February 14, 2009 06:42PM

Yes, all too often the cheap shops come back to bite you because you are stuck for them when the main shop cancels or changes. I had Bestmark change a shop on me a few months ago from an on-site visit to a phone shop. It had been the reasonable fee shop base on which a route of 'cheap-but-in-the-area' shops were constructed. Still got the cheap stuff. A bunch of gas burned for a whole lot of nothing.

February 14, 2009 08:43PM

For me it wasn't worth holding on the my relationship with MarketForce for their $4 shops, which I never did anyway. If I go and look they don't have anything for me on their site, but they called me the other day and left me a messge practically begging me to do a merchandising job that was bonused to $10! LOL I never called them back. I am too busy doing real shops.

I have such bad feelings toward MarketForce it isn't even funny.

They have that self-assign feature and the self-reschedule and the self-cancel feature, but they don't tell you that they keep track and if you cancel or even reschedule X amount of jobs they remove everything from your list. I explained to them that I cancelled a group of shops literally within 5 minutes when i realized I was calling a Spanish speaking town and it would have been a joke if I called there, and another shop was in an ethnic area and I would have looked like a fool just being in that area, so obvious, but they didn't care. That is why I like dealing with schedulers. Real people, real lives, real understanding. Not that I run into problems very often, but if I do I know I can let someone know what the problem was and they know it's the real deal and can advise on what to do.

February 14, 2009 09:50PM

I assume you are referring to the Certified part of Market Force rather than the Shop 'N Chek portion. I find the arm that was Shop 'N Chek is reasonable to deal with.

February 16, 2009 06:00AM

There's one advantage of doing a cheap merch job, and I learned this late. If you've done no marketing, you can then cite Certified as a previous marketing employer. Now you have that great thing, experience! I turned down a few cheap merch jobs long ago, and haven't been able to get anything since, for lack of experience.

Finally, RQA has accepted me for recall jobs. $12-15/hr, + travel. But it took me a year to find one co that would take me without experience. Peanut butter crackers, anyone?

February 18, 2009 03:23AM

Good for you, Sneakers. Salmonella has a bright side.

February 20, 2009 02:15PM

Funny!

And yes, I meant Certified. I wonder... should I check out (again with the pun) Shop N Check?

February 22, 2009 05:24AM

Flash Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Sounds more like something a competitor would do
> as certainly the store owner would know the size
> of the facilities.

I did several of these as well. The client was a third party vendor, trying to determine if certain stores were big enough to justify their placement of costly promotional materials.

February 22, 2009 09:12AM

I do them. Only because there are 9 of these stores in my little town. I can do all 9 stores, stop and grap a FF and still be home in time for dinner,do the paper work and still have time for something else. I have a set route that I do, so I am able to pick up a few other shops on my journey to do these.
They are usually quick, and after a few months you become familar with who is who in the store and they just let you do your thing. Yes they say $8.00 for the first hour, but I find that even with the paper work, it takes me less then 30 minutes for each store.

February 27, 2009 10:41PM

They now have $5 shops to take an inventory of 9 different types of cough drops. I was paid $9 to do champagne audits which took very little time, but $5? It's borderline insulting. I thought I would take a bunch and then I saw the fee.

Again, I just don't see how this is worth it unless you just hapen to be in the store already that day- and even then $5 seems like a joke to me.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/27/2009 10:44PM by SusanMB.

January 15, 2010 03:22AM

When you take an $8 shop with Certified and it takes 30 min, which is what is now ongoing with DVDs, by my calculations that makes it $16 per hour. I don’t know what kind of jobs you usually have, but I am not used to that kind of hourly wage for straightening DVDs.

January 15, 2010 03:57AM

I totally agree number1nana, but with that $16 I also usually consider reporting time on the computer, and time it takes me to get there.

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