I am Jerry Stritzke, CEO of REI and we’re closing all of

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My short bio: Hi Reddit. I’m Jerry Strizke, CEO of REI. You might have heard about us recently when we announced that we would be closing all of our stores on Black Friday this year. We’re paying our 12,000 employees to take the day off and we’re encouraging them to opt out of the Black Friday madness and spend the day outdoors with loved ones.

I have my team here helping me answer questions, so go easy on me. I’m new to reddit and have already learned the hard way that /r/Trees isn’t about the great outdoors.

Special thanks to /r/CampingAndHiking for sharing some questions in advance, so I’ll start with some of those.

Ask me anything!

Jerry

My Proof: https://twitter.com/REI/status/664229879345315840

EDIT: Wow. It looks like this AMA really took off last night. I appreciate the honest dialogue here and believe me when I say I'm listening.

When I signed off yesterday at 6PM PST, this AMA only had 300 comments and I did my best to make sure all the top questions were answered (as well as some fun and obscure questions). We knew that coming into reddit was a new frontier for us with a certain amount of risk, but I want you to know we're committed to this community and to being honest about REI. I see a lot of value in hearing from our employees and members in a candid and anonymous setting like this. Thank you for the good conversation and holding us accountable.

Comments: 5112 • Responses: 32 • Date: 2015-11-10 23:57:59 UTCsource

annonemp7638 karma2015-11-11 00:06:23 UTC

I am wondering why there is such an obsessive emphasis on membership sales? Why aren’t employees incentivised to sell memberships, but rather penalized for failing to do so?

I will be more specific. I worked in outdoor retail for several years, and was even a key-holding manager at a small local shop before I started with REI. I really liked the co-op business model and wanted to be a part of something bigger than a one store operation. I soon realized that while things like reliability and product knowledge mattered on paper, the actual priority of management was new member conversion. Even when we would exceed our daily sales goal or get a spectacular customer review, the main focus was on how many memberships were sold that day. With this in mind, I tried to strike a balance between providing exceptional service to pre-existing members and giving authentic membership pitches. Some days I would sell lots of memberships, some days I wouldn’t sell any, and most days I would sell a few.

Over the course of a year, I received top marks in my check ins, was eventually cross trained in every department, helped out with inventory preparations, stayed overnight to assist with store moves, and trained new batches employees in multiple departments. For a brief time my membership sales stagnated, but my quality of service and product knowledge continued to excel. It was like somebody flipped a switch. I was denied a promotion because I did not sell enough memberships. I had my hours cut from 30 hours a week to less than 10 because I did not sell enough memberships. Additionally, I was not allowed to pick up shifts from people that didn’t want to work because I did not sell enough memberships. Similar things happened to some of my most authentically qualified co-workers as well. Finally, after moving across the country with the assurance of a transfer, I was told by the store in the new city that I did not sell enough memberships and therefore they did not have any room on the payroll for me. I was not even given the courtesy of an interview with the store to assess any of my other skills, just a brief email wishing me good luck. I lost my health insurance, a source of much needed income, and any potential co-worker friends in a new city where I knew no one. It seems that management would rather take on the expense of hiring and training someone new than risk a lower membership conversion rate from a reliable and cross-trained employee. I liked my job and hope this is an isolated incident, but my experience involves two stores of very different sizes in two very different cities.

I fully understand the need to hold employees to a high standard, but why is the approach so unbalanced? How is it in the best interest of the co-op to focus so exclusively on a performance metric that has no direct benefit for customers who are already members?

Update: Wow. The tremendous amount of support I have received from the community is truly humbling. I was hoping to start a conversation and have certainly done that. The customer responses and posts that confirm my experience mean more to me than any sort of packaged corporate answer. Please support local, authentic, outdoor retail.

I am Jerry Stritzke, CEO of REI and we’re closing all of our stores on Black Friday. Ask me anything!