Store Manager Review

I currently work at a company called Toolstation that is under the Travis Perkins group. We provide a large variety of DIY and trade products ranging from paint, screws, power tools and accessories to workwear, garden furniture and full on kitchens! I work in the sales department in one of our retail stores as the store manager. I've been with the company for four years this coming December and have worked my way to this role from the lowest role the company offers which is sales advisor. Without the retail teams, the only other method of income is direct shipped online sales so the retail teams are a massive part of our business and without us I highly doubt the company would be the size it is today with approximately five hundred and fifty stores. Within the retail stores we hold the majority of our stock in smaller quantities to serve the customers every day, with us storing all that stock the stock management is important and has its own set of challenges.

Working here I have learned a lot about people skill and how to go about learning and training with new members of the team, my apprenticeship has also helped with that. I have also learned about maintaining a functioning team and store and about stock storage, how to present stock in a way that helps promote more sales.

My program was good but very stressful as I was sold on the idea that it would be done in work time which was extremely false, I did at least 80% of the work at home on days of or while on holiday because the store teams run on minimal staff its near impossible to get the time to sit down and do the work in store, so overall no I did not enjoy the course.

The program is quite well structured for the most part, it is clear what the sections are about but are some times very wordy and it can be a bit difficult to know what your being asked but the advisers are good at helping you understand anything your unsure about.

I received very little because with the current company's standing with staff and hours in store they couldn't do anything so in order for me to pass I had to deal with it and do the work in my own time. I'm not sure if the other apprentices felt the same on my course, perhaps their store has more hours to use than ours so it wasn't as big of an issue for them but we are one of the lower hour model stores and its rare to have more than 2 members of staff in at a time.

The training provider did as much as they could to help keen me calm at my most stressed of times via email and the occasional video call on google meet. They would help by talking me through questions that I didn't understand properly due to the strange words some times used.

Honestly the majority of the course came as common sense for me so it was much more a case of brilliant I can do this at work and get it on my CV but of course that didn't happen and I had to do the work at home most of the time but ive now got the qualification so no more stress to find the time!

There are not, the stores are too spread out for anything like that and were also open 7 days a week and open most hours of every day so not everyone could attend, its a nightmare arranging a Christmas night out let alone any regular activity for all the staff to attend. This company does not promote much of a healthy social life with its working hours, this is also due to the minimal staff in every store.

Yes

I would recommend the job to a friend because it is easy once you have learned the system, I would warn them about the hours and how there isn't a massive incentive to go above and beyond. But you can enter auto-pilot and the days fly by, the pay is lower than it should be really for a company of this size but its a quick job to pick up and because staff turn over is pretty large across the company there is room to grow and expand on your CV to then apply for better paid jobs in the future.

Get in, get stuck in and work your way up. They pay doesnt get terribly good until your at manager pay but even then thats underpaid by quite a large margin in comparison to other retail jobs but because the path to manager in this company is quite easy to attain do it and stick it out for a few years then swap to a different job with the better pay. As many reviews say on job websites for Toolstation its a perfect beginner management role.