At a time when the French aspire to consume more responsibly and to be accompanied in their purchases, the increase in the skills of sales advisors, the first brand ambassadors, is a fundamental issue.
This trend is confirmed by the recent study on the ideal retailer of tomorrow by ObSoCo1, which highlights the desire of consumers to benefit from authentic and personalized advice in stores.
With this in mind, the Alliance du Commerce has developed a training course on the life cycle of textiles: “Knowing well to advise well”. The material gathers the essential information to inform customers about clothing items. Each topic corresponds to a stage in the product’s life cycle: fibers, labels, rules of origin, maintenance, sorting instructions and second-hand goods.
This innovative tool is intended for in-store sales teams, which represent nearly 90% of the 170,000 employees of the member companies of the Trade Alliance.
It comes in 3 forms:
- a mobile training application: “Planet Retail”;
- a colour chart/fan, which brings together the essential information for sales advisors;
- a binder, which deepens the concepts, for store managers.
The “Planet Retail” mobile application
The “Planet Retail” application, a solution developed with Teach on Mars, an expert in mobile learning and game-based learning2 , enables sales teams to reinforce their knowledge of sustainable development issues with agility and learning pleasure. Their smartphone (Android or iOS) becomes their learning companion to practice while having fun.
Cross-channel, the device offers learners the possibility to connect to “Planet Retail” from their laptop or tablet, via the dedicated web application.
These training programs were developed with the help of the ISTA Business School Textile Fashion Leather, the collaboration of Cofreet, Refashion and the retail skills firm RMS, and the financial support of DEFI (Comité professionnel de développement économique de l’habillement).