Job Description - Final

Surf Shop Floor Staff

Working at a surf shop really is as enjoyable as it sounds. For starters, the people you work with are some of the most down to earth and fun people you can imagine. Half of them surf like there’s no tomorrow, another quarter of them skate outside on their breaks, and then come snow season everybody runs for the mountains. To say the least, the people you will work with know how to have a good time.

Being on the floor at a surf shop basically means doing any task that comes your way. The job has a lot of upsides, and you get to meet new people every day. Sometimes a brand “rep” (representative) comes in and hands out shirts to the whole shop, or maybe you’re lucky and the guy from Von Zipper hands you a brand-new pair of sunglasses just because he had an extra pair in the truck. You never know what the day might bring. The one thing you do know is that the day will probably not be a dull one. Especially with there always being at least one shop-dog around to brighten everybody’s mood.

Most days at the shop are pretty laid back and not too hectic, but of course there are exceptions. Particularly around the holidays, the store is busy all day long and you seem to be running back and forth from one corner of the shop to the next. To get a better understanding, the typical day as floor staff at a surf shop involves:

• Shopping

• Stocking

• Blocking

Now that you know the basic roles, let’s get into their descriptions.

Shopping

You may not think of shopping as the first task you might have working in a retail store. In reality, shopping for other people is your main job. The amount of people that come in with just a color or brand in mind asking you what shirt they should get is too hard to count. To be successful at handling this, the only solution is to constantly be shopping all day and know which shirts are popular, what shirts you like, and where you just saw them. Sometimes it’s as easy as it sounds and sometimes you will show some person fifty different pairs of board shorts for an hour just to have them go back and get the very first pair you grabbed them. While it can be frustrating, you can’t complain about shopping around all day; especially with a nice employee discount that keeps you thinking what hat or jacket I should buy next.

Stocking

The second role of being a floor staff member at a surf shop is stocking, organizing, and refolding the clothes on all the racks in the store. The task sounds scarier than it really is. There are always people stationed in different areas of the store that rotate every so often, and when it’s your turn to do the stocking role for the time being, you go section to section and have the person over there help you if they’re not busy. While it is usually easy to do, stocking can be quite frustrating. People are always picking up shirts to look at and grabbing things off hangers which is not a problem. It’s actually the point of having all the available sizes and items out on the floor, but the problem comes when people start leaving stuff scattered in wrong places and knock over entire stacks of shirts that you just folded so perfectly five minutes ago all so they could grab the shirt from the very bottom of the pile and throw it back down two seconds later when they decide they don’t even want it.

Blocking

Possibly the most underrated and exciting part of the job is being the front line of defense (aka the blockers) when it comes to thieves. It honestly happens more than you probably think. Being a good blocker not only has to do with paying attention, but it requires a sort of sixth sense. Sometimes a person comes into the store, and you can tell they are just simply up to no good. For instance, one day I was working the front door saying hello to customers as they walked in. At some point during the day a man walks and it’s not too hard to tell— his vibe was just off. I ended up deciding to keep an eye on him while he was shopping and as he was making his way to the dressing room where I told the person working over there to be on their toes as well. Lo and behold, we end up hearing some plastic cracking and breaking from inside one of the rooms, and as the man walks out— his outfit has completely changed, we look and see broken security tags in the room, and boom all the sudden he makes a jump straight for the door. Another employee shut the door before he made it and that was that. 

Conclusion

Now that you’ve seen what it takes to work on the floor staff at a surf shop, are you ready for the ride? It is definitely a great experience to have, and even if it is only for a summer or a first job, I doubt it is a decision you will regret.