A Day in the Life of a Retail Assistant #105 Hi everyone! It has been an incredible week here in Norfolk! A lot has gone on in a short week.
On Monday, I was joined in the shop with Sharon. We worked through the mountains of online orders, which seemed never ending! I had one of my regulars come in to purchase a few cigars to get through the week. Of course I showed him my one of my new favourite cigar – the Macanudo M By Macanudo Dark Toro. I cannot stress enough how much chocolate this cigar exhumes! The rest of the day was taken up by online pickings, it certainly looked like everyone was getting their smokes in early ready for the bank holiday weekend!
Tuesday was my marketing day. I focused massively on the shop newsletters as I was a bit behind with them and had to get them done and proof read by our content manager. By the end of the day I had all but one of them completed. In between newsletters I wrote an article for the C.Gars cigar library – It was about the ST Dupont Le Mans Accessories, which I think is the most beautiful of the range. You can read that article here. I also spent some time taking pictures of them and hopefully I have done them justice. I also focussed on creating another article ready for next week… You’ll have to read next week’s blog to find out what it is about. Towards the end of the day I was asked to post an article about our management team’s appearance at the AITS Ignite trade show. I was handed the article and loads of pictures to choose from – You can read that by clicking here. It sounded so fascinating! And I learned a lot too. I was particularly happy to hear that the Drew Estate Blackened cigars had made their way into the UK market! They are very popular in the USA and are made in collaboration with James Hetfield – The lead singer of Metallica! I grew up listening to Metallica, so to have a cigar which has been approved from the James Hetfield is incredible! We are also going to be blessed with a couple of new Cubans – The Montecristo Open Slam and the Partagas Mille Fleurs. It is certainly an exciting time in the UK cigar industry!
On Thursday, I was working in the shop. I spent a lot of time stocking up the humidors and organising the pipe room. I had also noticed that the Drew Estate Blackened had been delivered during my day off as well as many new cigars which you will see on our website very soon! I have also been working closely with Lisa on organising our brand new humidor! This one is not available for the public to see, however we can always give you a sneak peak! We have been keeping our eye on the humidity closely making sure it is perfect, ready for us both to fill it.
Friday was incredibly busy! Lisa and I worked together to fill up our new humidor. We decided to put full boxes in there which then frees up the shelves in our walk-in humidor for our open boxes. This makes it easier to pick orders and for us to be able to show you cigars which aren’t necessarily on the shelves. We were both running between both humidors to try to get it done as quickly as possible! In between we were both needed to help out the rest of the team with deliveries. Due to the stock available at the AITS Ignite trade show, we had ordered LOADS of stock! And it was all coming in on Friday! So I was doing numerous trips up and down the stairs, putting stock in their place. Then later on in the afternoon, one of the biggest deliveries I had seen came in! There were loads of cigars, pipe tobacco and more! Keep an eye on the website and you will see what we have come in!
On Saturday, It was Josh, Will and myself. Josh completed the Cuban stock count by himself! We unfortunately didn’t have time on Friday to get it completed, so Josh focused his time on Saturday to complete it. Will finished doing the deliveries and I noticed we had received a box of Cohiba Lanceros! They are a legendary cigar which I had never seen before! It was one of Fidel Castro’s favourite cigars and was often used as diplomatic gifts.
Will also got to serve his first customer! It is a big milestone and hopefully it has given him the confidence to serve even more in the shop. He was with them for a while which is always a good sign. As soon as that customer left, Will served the next customer! I think now he has a taste for it and he loves it!
I hope you have enjoyed this weeks goings on and I hope to see you all in Norfolk very soon.
So long for now.
Oliver.
