I know a lot of people on here don’t like Harvey Norman. But I want to see what people want to know. Or if I can help people understand anything. I worked there for 4 years. In sales and in the back end for a bit.
[AMA] I Was a Salesperson at Harvey Norman. Ask Me Anything. I’ll Do My Best to Answer
Related Stores
closed Comments
Not much really. Some stores do more than others but my store not much.
Had no idea benefits differed from store to store, I would've thought it'd be a standardised system e.g. every employee gets x% off, same offers and deals
No so basically we get stuff at the cost the store buys it at. Which is generally not as much as a normal customer gets.
@Rudy2000: It was the same when I worked at JB (10+ years ago). Thought it was a sweet perk until I realised that a lot of the games and DVDs were sold at close to or below cost anyway just to get people in the door.
@PurchaseAnxiety: Thats because the 'cost price' visible to you is the list price, not the actual price to get that good in after considering accompanying discounts. They would allocate those profits to procurement.
It's because each store is Franchised so every store is run differently, with a lot of similarities. I used to work there many moons ago as an assistant manager and stores would even undercut each other in order to hit sales targets.
Leaving at 5pm
Which department/s on the floor?
Whitegoods
All goods matter!!!
why only whitegoods?
How do you live with yourself?
Just kidding.
Yes
What item(s) had the biggest commissions?
There isn’t actually as much commission as a lot of people think. Usually your brands like Miele washers and AEG
Vaguesperson.
If there's not as much as we think then why do employees basically sprint to ask "need a hand with anything?"
Because we do still make commission. A lot of salespeople want to make some money. Also a lot of managers make this a thing also
The sales people have targets they need to hit, the majority of the profit is made selling warranties and accessories. Not always but most of the time. Sometimes the stores get special deals from suppliers to push certain brands, i.e. sell X amount of Logitech stuff and get $500 worth of Logitech stuff for free. I managed to get one of the $800 speaker sets for free just by selling what I normally would.
@xazark: This also. Pushing to get sales was a big thing because you wanted to hit your targets because that’s what your job was. Nearly all of the Harvey Norman staff or even other commission based jobs are there to make money. The more sales the more money. The more add odds the more money. It’s like McDonald’s and saying do you want fries with that.
@xazark: i miss them days dicksmith sell target of cannon get free trip to syd for training brand give way free shit navman and logitech and MS stuff.
Retail 101. Customers complain if you do, complain if you don't and complaints via google for not serving are a thing.
@tetsuma: I wish I could just explain how retail works and everything. Just sit down and do a massive Australia wide AMA.
when sort of discounts can be negotiated?
Actually very hard one to answer. A lot of brands actually are the ones that put money behind them. Hence why most company’s are the same price. If a salesperson says it’s at cost or under. Most of the time it is. Not really a percentage I can give
In the late 90s all HN stock had a sticker with a number which, when read backwards, showed the cost price, the 'floor' price (never completely sure what this was - cost plus GST and some other add ons?), and the regular retail price.
Was very handy whenever they tried the old "yeah nah it's already below cost" and you'd say "yeah the cost price is actually X, wanna try again?"
Our system actually tells us everything. I know some stores still do this. But it can be a bit of an inconvenience when prices change so often (especially now with costs going up on everything with Covid)
@Rudy2000: they tell you all the margins, rebates, incentives, actual supplier cost, not ex Harvery Normans warehouse cost..
@taoz: Yes. We can see a lot of costs. Mostly the franchisee or 2IC can see all costs. But not general staff. This is why sales staff go to managers a lot to see all the costs.
Lol do you expect them to honour selling at cost price for your benefit…
I heard of this before the Internet on a BBS. Told an employee and he burst out in anger and shortly after the system was changed.
There was no GST in the ‘90s. It was implemented in July 2000.
can you give any concrete examples you remember?
What do you mean?
Gerry doesn’t have much to do with Harevy Norman anymore. So sadly no.
Why sadly no? Are you keen to work on Gerry's back end?
Yeah. I’ve never had anything to do with Gerry. Don’t think I want too. He hasn’t had anything to with the company in a long time. But I mean hey. I may get paid for it.
He has plenty to do with it still. He owns almost every building and charges the rent to the proprietors. Every sign and banner in the store is his, he prints and charges for them.
How long can you sleep on the beds before getting shooed away?
Well. Most bedding departments are quiet from what I know. Most of them probably won’t notice unless you snore.
I once had to wake up a HN salesperson who was 'resting' on one of the beds in the store. There were no other staff in the section and I thought it was heaps awkward but he didn't seem fazed at all. It was within 15mins of closing on a Thurs night so it must have been a long day.
Honestly. Would not surprise me
it must be a good mattress saleman. Proved on the spot!
@ntt: lol - i didn't consider it a sales strategy at the time as I was only buying a pillow but yes, you may be right!
@[Deactivated]: do you want me to demonstrate how good is this mattress, look! I'm going to sleep in front of you in no time!
@ntt: Anything for a sale!
Just thinking that it would be an excellent job for uni students - they could literally crash at work on their w/e shifts after a big Fri/Sat night & be paid to sleep on the floor stock. Only problem could be waking them up in order to close the sale.
@[Deactivated]: I remember there was an ad, recruiting people just to sleep for reasearching purposes. I regretted I didn't applly for that job.
Does it get old targeting cashed up Octogenarians who are just trying to burn through the last of their cash from their 3 recently sold investment properties?
For me yes.
Everyone was hooking up with each other
Is this a question?
I wish.
At the conferences this was a very common thing
Employees demostrating the build quality of the beds… Occasionally the couches too.
Where was the last work Christmas party and any interesting stories
Honesty hasn’t been one since 2019. Can’t remember anything because I didn’t go to it.
how do u sleep at night!
sorry we have really bad thoughts about Harvey Norman salesmen flogging expensive old tech to people who don't know tech
Unfortunately some computers departments in some stores can be a bit like this. I know the store I was at was actually very focused on customer service.
A HN salesman added $300 on top of a $800 laptop because the customer is old and do not have a glue.
He was savage and everyone working there hates him. He is also Australia number 1 sales person at the time.
That was $25 years ago.
Yeah. Some old sales tactics would be to bump
Up the price. Never have I ever seen it. But it was a very old thing. I hate the idea of doing it. But pretty sure you’d get in MASSIVE trouble now if you even thought of it.Hahaha I did work experience in HN computer sales back in like….01 or 03, we needed a celeron so went to a nearby computer store, $230 or so. Got back to store, plugged it in then invoiced the customer for $480
I went back recently and the sales guy that was all '(profanity) this place I'm gonna leave, don't get into IT sales mate' …..he's still there.
I'll make sure to bring clag next time I negotiate at hardly normal
On top of a pile of money, with many beautiful ladies
Do you get a sample coffee from the Delonghi sales rep on a daily basis and do you tell them the Nescafe Expresso pods tastes a bit better better, or do you prefer the Blend 43 in the tea room?
Some stores do. Ours did not. I don’t drink coffee anyway
Is there a A1 size framed photo of Jerry on the back-office wall?
No. Gerry doesn’t have much to do with Harvey Norman at all anymore.
Why does the cost price include a small profit as I have tried got HN to price match and it's always below cost? The other stores are smaller and therefore buy at a higher price than HN, but they sell cheaper.
A lot of stores that aren’t Harvey Norman actually don’t have as much to pay back. Like in a normal sale at Harvey Norman the salesperson gets paid. The boss gets paid. The company gets paid. Along with more money to go towards new stock and sometimes company’s get a share of the money. A lot of smaller companies that are cheaper. Only usually pay the salesperson and the company. But we generally do price match. Just means the salesperson doesn’t get paid as much or at all for the sale.
Never have HN prices matched as the price is always below cost.
This is OZ bargain site for a reason.
Depends on a few factors. If the company has it in stock. If there is no stock we won’t match because we have it no point price matching if we have it in stock and can make a profit every store would do this. We also won’t match if the store has a delivery fee to get it to you (if the store isn’t local). Because that’s what you Would have to pay for it to get to you from the company.
@Rudy2000: So, even though HN would charge a delivery fee they won't take that into account when supposedly price matching?
@Grunntt: If you want the goods delivered typically we won’t charge extra fees for delivery. Depends on the store you get and the franchisee.
@Rudy2000: Unfortunately some of my more elderly relatives still buy from HN - I asked them about their experience in not being charged for delivery.
Not one of them have ever not been charged for delivery (at least in the past 4 - 5 years that they can clearly recall).@Grunntt: Yeah I find this at some stores. It is a shame that other good stores get bad reputations from these types of stores.
It is a shame that other good stores get bad reputations from these types of stores.
Yeah - that's the risk that you accept with being a franchise.
I was told by the manager that HN franchise cannot be bought but is given, hence Jerry Harvey get a large chunk of the profit. How it work is you have to get promoted to store manager then do a good enough job with sufficient reference from other store franchisee then Jerry will give you one of his store.
With the bulk of the money going to Jerry which might explain why HN cannot price match
Well yes and no. Depends on brands prices and all that sort of stuff. I said to someone earlier that we have a lot more costs than even I Would know. So we would pay company. The salesperson. The boss and the supplier. Much more also that I can’t think of. But some company’s just pay the supplier and their own company
It doesn't include a small "profit" exactly. It includes the transport and other costs that the business has in getting that item to the shelf.
Is Joyce Mayne & Domayne just HN with another name?
Sure are. They even run the same adds and prices are the same.
Yes. Joyce Mayne and Domayne are mostly NSW based though. They also sometimes have a few extra departments. Such as bathrooms and gardening and sport.
What was your hit rate like with product care?
Mine was consistently 0 for product care and flexirent sign ups (biggest scam ever)I think product care was very well worth it. Some people misunderstood. A lot of salespeople unfortunately were very bad at talking about it. Flexirent I couldn’t agree more. Hated flexirent with a passion.
My product care hit rate was around 25-35 percent also.I remember this dude in his 20s came in with a flexi pre approval wanting a ps3 and games. Tried to talk him out of it and get it on interest free instead. Didn’t budge. I felt bad.
I think I did the same. Customer wanted a TV on flexirent. Tried to show him intrest free but he said he likes flexirent. Poor guy
Probably thought you were trying to sign him up to some expensive finance option (sarcasm). Even if you're in a position to use the payments as a tax deduction, I can't understand why anyone would use Flexirent. I really can't. It's basic math.
I was never any good at selling Flexirent, I felt so bad. The 2IC and franchisee kept pushing me. I gave in and got slimy; sold it to some lady, skimmed over all the shit parts, then she came back in the next day and complained to the manager. Ended up cancelling the contract and going with the GE interest free option. I felt awful, and then I'm in trouble for misleading her.
Glad I left and did something with my life.
how do you know how much you can haggle/what is the best way to haggle?
This can be tough. Generally I think when I get along with a customer I would be more nice back. If you’re being really demanding on a discount it doesn’t help your case. get along with the salesperson and don’t beg or tell a sob story. Doesn’t usually do much for us. Just nice customers or good chats are good for some salespeople.
thanks for the insight!
I saw Gerry Harvey interviewed a few years ago on a business show. If I recall correctly, he said 4% off big ticket items was realistic with some haggling.
Best way to haggle at HN is to buy it elsewhere. It is basically like hens teeth finding an item that HN will negotiate a better price than somewhere (anywhere?) else will give it to you for. They add a heap of costs onto the cost price that the staff can see, warehouse cost, Franchisee cost etc.. so the "cost" price is significantly higher than anywhere else. The only deals that are sometimes worth it is their Marquee deals on the front page of their catologue as they are often sold "below cost" to get people in the door for the sales person to then try to sell you on Flexirent, upgrades, warranty etc..
This was just apart of you targets that you had monthly. If you look most of the stores like JB and GoodGuys are similar prices on almost everything. It’s because the supplier are the ones that give the prices. Company’s like Amazon or Appliances online try to grow there sales by dropping prices a little bit lower.
ah, right.
What were your employee benefits?