Overemployment In Department Stores

[think_too_mut]

Thanks steveromagnino. The point about overemployment in other areas that are non profit making, such as security guards and cleaners still baffles me though, as these cannot simply be written off. Perhaps just inefficiency in productivity?

9 girls manning this shop at Don Muang, 2 years ago. Next to KFC. Air side.

The cola cups were in a compensation for taking this pic of them. That's how I know there were 9 of them in that cozy space.

[mbkudu]

According to the small retail businesses I know that also employ lots of staff its answerable in one word: shoplifting.

You have to ask one question: Who really ends up leaving with more unpaid merchandise, the shop lifters or the employees who also steal?

[Heng]

Much easier to monitor, manage, and if need be, track down employees. You have all of their info, and they take to being padded down/harrassed a lot better than customers do.

[steveromagnino]

Thanks steveromagnino. The point about overemployment in other areas that are non profit making, such as security guards and cleaners still baffles me though, as these cannot simply be written off. Perhaps just inefficiency in productivity?

they are cheap, there are insurance 'breaks' for having certain numbers of security staff (sometimes) and often the service level agreements provided to tenants means you have to have large numbers of security staff and cleaners.

But biggest one is a major driver of how people choose shopping centres and where to shop (other than the overriding issue of convenience/parking) is mall ambiance, and cleanliness is a major driver of this. Security is another.

Interestingly, I don't think most malls even have decently clean toilets, but at least they throw tons of staff in a half hearted attempt to address it.

[prighas]

I've lived here long enough to probably know not to ask questions that require a logical answer.

Amen to that. LOL

[Jimjim]

I've lived here long enough to probably know not to ask questions that require a logical answer. But here goes anyway:

Why do most Thai-owned department stores employ so many staff? I'm thinking particularly of places like Emporium, Central, Siam Paragon etc. In any of these there are several staff in each location with never enough to do, except form an audience to a would-be shopper. This is the more confusing on a Monday when many wear yellow polo shirts and are chatting in groups so that they are unidentifiable as staff. Neither do they seem to move out of the way when you try and look at merchandise.

I know labour is cheap in Thailand, but I just wonder how cheap. Surely it can't make continued sense to employ far more staff than are required? But maybe there is a labour law that requires there to be overstaffing, as this phenomenon occurs in so many areas of Thai businesses, such as cleaning companies - we have an army at our condo, security guards etc etc. Are owners of businesses not bothered by the bottom line?

I haven't seen yet what I think is the most likely answer, at least according to my own experience.

When I first came to Thailand I came at the same time as some friends of mine (a young married couple). At least for the first couple months, they were very interested in the culture and always asked a lot of questions. One time when I was with them they asked why there were so many staff at stores, and also so many security guards and cleaners everywhere. For example, why do we need some lady at Tesco to man the escalator and pull the shopping cart off the escalator for us?

We were told that in Thai culture it is encouraged to give numerous low-paying jobs to the poorer classes so they can have some money to live. Kind of a Thai sense of civic duty to their fellow Thais. It may sound wierd, but that's what we were told. So my answer would be shoplifting, maybe yes, absenteeism, makes sense, etc. and all the answers sound good, but I don't think it's so complicated. There are so many staff with simple, dull jobs because that's just the culture. They provide jobs that sometimes seem meaningless when nobody seems to be doing anything because they believe they ought to, need to, and as it doesn't cost a rich business owner too much to pay such low salaries, why not provide work for someone who genuinely needs the money?

I never really had a question about it once I was told that, and it makes sense to me. I don't think this will ever change. I see it everywhere and I think it's a great observation that samtam made. That's just how they roll in Thailand. You certainly don't see so many security guards in the U.S. but here, they're everywhere. Some places they have more use than others. I think they see that someone can be helpful for a very low wage, and so they employ lots of helpers.

[TukTukDriver]

Good post. I have always wondered about this. I usually thought the marginal cost to marginal revenue made the most sense. It's not just retail, you see it in bars as well, even those where you can't barfine the girls. One thing all these shops do get is busy spurts. I have walked into Robinsons and seen all the staff busy. It's rare, but I have seen it.

I'm sometimes just as surprised by the LACK of staff here in the US. I went to a bar on New Years Eve and even though there were about 300 customers they only had 3 people behind the bar and only 2 of them were actually serving drinks. It was near impossible to get one. Think how much they lost, it save me alone about $30. Funny, but I left saying, "This would never have happened in Thailand".

[markah]

I have a business here and i over staff because of the absenteeism. You have to hire at 150% of what you actually need to make sure you havee nough workers.

true, my business is staffed by 40 Thais, same business in the UK I would need 12.

my staff come late, dont turn up at all or are regulary sick. forever swapping shifts and days off. and when they do work they are not always aware of customers in the place. believe me, I treat the staff really good and I am very fair with them. they also get great salaries ranging from 8000 to 16000 a month + tips with no collage degrees. Thai's do not think that they have work the next day when they are having a night out, they just wake up and come when they are ready.

they are very dificult to control, so it just makes life easier to employ extra.

[chayatom]

I would suggest another reason : because labor is so cheap, it would be unthinkable for a Departement store owner not to have a legion of staff.

Staff comes along with goods displayed on the shelf, or decorative elements.

If you push forward : having a few staff, eventhough extremely efficient, would be a sign that your shop is... cheap indeed.

I mean : what would be Siam Parangon with less staff ? Une faute de gout, at least for asian taste.

As usual in Thailand there is more to this than meets the eye and its got very little to do with shoplifting

The way the department system works in Thaialnd is that each small section of the department store will be contracted out to a particular brand and rent for the space paid on a consignment basis ie; a percentage of the sales generated- this brand supplies their own staff to sell their products and any sales are rung up by the cashier who works for the department store operator.

In this way the staff employed by the Department store operator is kept to a minimum as is their cost of holding stock - it is all borne by the operator of the brand.

Thst is why you see staff standing around a particular section and when you want to purchase a product from the section next to them they willnot serve you and go off and find somebody else who is employed by the brand you are interested in to serves you.

Its a very inefficient system but works well for the department store operators

[Heng]

Is there an echo in here?

[chayatom]

Is there an echo in here?

only between your ears....

[Heng]

You're funny.

[chayatom]

You're not

....an impressive 2665 posts Heng ...you must know a lot about everything or is it nothing?

I have been a retailer for the past 20 years and in Thailand with a leading retailer for the past 8 years. On this particular topic i know what i am talking about whereas most of the previous posts seemed to be opinions rather than informed views.

Your sarcasm was unnecessary

[samran]

You're not

....an impressive 2665 posts Heng ...you must know a lot about everything or is it nothing?

I have been a retailer for the past 20 years and in Thailand with a leading retailer for the past 8 years. On this particular topic i know what i am talking about whereas most of the previous posts seemed to be opinions rather than informed views.

Your sarcasm was unnecessary

Firstly, welcome to Thai visa Chayatom.

Secondly, slow down. Three posts in and you are having a go already..... Sometimes threads just start repeating themselves, and this particular thread has been running for a while.

I don't know much about Heng, other than he knows alot, has a unique and well grounded point of view of doing business in Thailand (he is Thai) with an extensive network of family run busineses.

[Losangels]

Yes there is a big difference in the amount of staff use here compared to the US. Just as the previous poster mentioned(my quote key funtion, reply funtion and addreply don't work) that in a typical bar there are only one two or the most three bartenders in the counter bar. Where here they may be up to a dozen. Bearing this in mind, the service here is slower and many times have my drink order messed up. When I first came here it used to bother me however I have gotten used to it (made myself) or the other option is stay home and drink which can rather be boring.

[steveromagnino]

You're not

....an impressive 2665 posts Heng ...you must know a lot about everything or is it nothing?

I have been a retailer for the past 20 years and in Thailand with a leading retailer for the past 8 years. On this particular topic i know what i am talking about whereas most of the previous posts seemed to be opinions rather than informed views.

Your sarcasm was unnecessary

I think you will find the reference to an echo, was perhaps pointing out that I have already written pretty much the same thing, only about 40 posts earlier:

(steveromagnino)

>>Fact - the additional staff cost 5,000b but can generate incremental sales of more than 5,000b in profit a month using ABC...therefore....a good investment.

In many cases, the small shop in shop area within a department store has staff from the brand itself, while Central ALSO has staff operating the tills (since Central gets paid as a proportion of turnover), so if the shop in shop area is very small, they have to maybe have 2-3 staff to allow for breaks and also to take into account that if one person is helping a customer, then there needs to be someone else free.

Your wise post, plus 20 years of retail experience, including 8 here are good to know, but you probably could do with slightly more of a sense of humour :-) There are some here on this board, that probably know more about retail than you do :-))))

[Heng]

You're not

....an impressive 2665 posts Heng ...you must know a lot about everything or is it nothing?

I have been a retailer for the past 20 years and in Thailand with a leading retailer for the past 8 years. On this particular topic i know what i am talking about whereas most of the previous posts seemed to be opinions rather than informed views.

Your sarcasm was unnecessary

Well, you'll get used to it. I wasn't doubting your credentials... although all you did was repeat what was already said by another poster with similar credentials.

[soundman]

I have a business here and i over staff because of the absenteeism. You have to hire at 150% of what you actually need to make sure you havee nough workers.

true, my business is staffed by 40 Thais, same business in the UK I would need 12.

my staff come late, dont turn up at all or are regulary sick. forever swapping shifts and days off. and when they do work they are not always aware of customers in the place. believe me, I treat the staff really good and I am very fair with them. they also get great salaries ranging from 8000 to 16000 a month + tips with no collage degrees. Thai's do not think that they have work the next day when they are having a night out, they just wake up and come when they are ready.

they are very dificult to control, so it just makes life easier to employ extra.

Very good point,

I run a factory where we have positions for 30 +/- staff, we have about 40 on the books, & it doesn't matter what day of the week, there will only ever be 25 - 30 in attendance. The rest are off for whatever reason, believe me I have heard all the excuses in the world for absentteism.

Fact of business life in thailand.

Soundman.

[chayatom]

You're not

....an impressive 2665 posts Heng ...you must know a lot about everything or is it nothing?

I have been a retailer for the past 20 years and in Thailand with a leading retailer for the past 8 years. On this particular topic i know what i am talking about whereas most of the previous posts seemed to be opinions rather than informed views.

Your sarcasm was unnecessary

Firstly, welcome to Thai visa Chayatom.

Secondly, slow down. Three posts in and you are having a go already..... Sometimes threads just start repeating themselves, and this particular thread has been running for a while.

I don't know much about Heng, other than he knows alot, has a unique and well grounded point of view of doing business in Thailand (he is Thai) with an extensive network of family run busineses.

heh common i was just innocently giving my opinion on a simple matter that seems to be generating a lot of comment, little of which seems to be coming from people who actually work in this business or know how it works. The fact that i was reiterating Steve's comment was in response to the subsequent posts that seemed to be still searching for an answer.

Hengs post was sarcastic and didn't add anything to the conversation and as this was my first post ever i thought it was, at the very least unfriendly. Yes my response was a bit prickly but his reply was worse.

Anyway the point of me contributing to this forum was not to get involved in a slanging match.

[DragonQuest]

because this is asia, theres more peolpe then jobs, and besides I like flirty with 5 hot chicks on 1 corner or the store lol

[IMA_FARANG]

I've lived here long enough to probably know not to ask questions that require a logical answer. But here goes anyway:

Why do most Thai-owned department stores employ so many staff? I'm thinking particularly of places like Emporium, Central, Siam Paragon etc. In any of these there are several staff in each location with never enough to do, except form an audience to a would-be shopper. This is the more confusing on a Monday when many wear yellow polo shirts and are chatting in groups so that they are unidentifiable as staff. Neither do they seem to move out of the way when you try and look at merchandise.

I know labour is cheap in Thailand, but I just wonder how cheap. Surely it can't make continued sense to employ far more staff than are required? But maybe there is a labour law that requires there to be overstaffing, as this phenomenon occurs in so many areas of Thai businesses, such as cleaning companies - we have an army at our condo, security guards etc etc. Are owners of businesses not bothered by the bottom line?