New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1906-05-20
SCHOOLS FOR CLERKS.
Where Training Needed for Dealing
scith Customers Can BE Secured.

Schools where clerks IN stores and those as
piring for such positions may be taught how TO
wait on customers and to fathom human nature
are among the latest educational schemes.
Graduates from these institutions are able TO
step into actual sales work in department and
other stores without having TO serve an appren-
ticeship cash girl. bundle girl. etc
Boston is said 10 be the city where the selling
trade was first taught. the schools being an
outcome OF the welfare work carried on among
the employees OF the retail drygoods houses there.
But the plan is being adopted elsewhere. and
is meeting with as much success in the New
England city.
I'm Boston both day and night classes are
held" said New-YorlS merchant. Those pat
ronizing the day classes are generally boys and
girls fourteen years old and up, who want to
obtain positions in retail stores, while the stu
dents in the evening classes are the clerks who
are already employed These latter take the
course so that they may rise in their depart
ments sooner than il left to their own devices
and the uncertain task Of learning the business
from those directly over them.
THE younger pupils are taught spelling. pen
manship and arithmetic. while the older ones
receive instruction in human nature through
lectures on psychology. knowledge of how
to deal with each one of the many kinds Of GUS
toners with which g, clerk comes in contact in
single day is an invaluablo asset in his or her
experience.
THE time when a girl unable to do anything
else can obtain position in drygoods store is
a thing of the pas. Merchants want trained
clerks now. we'll dressed. we'll appearing, refined
and cultured. and those stores where such are
found get the best trade and the most of it.
Persons who come in contact with the public in
these modern days must be intelligent and tact
F,,l 10th is I'm a or
ness. In their efforts to obtain these trained
workers large stores are paying higher salaries.
Sometimes clerks are born. but the majority
of then, have to serve an apprenticeship before
they are capable of going behind a counter and
coming in contact with the kinds Of persons who
patronize a largo establishment. The need for
a knowledge of arithmetic, spelling and PEN
manship is greater nowadays. when each sale
requires such a number Of entries on different
slips, than it used to be when the systems IN
vogue for handling money and making record
of the sales even in the large stores were SIM
pier.
But it is the human nature study that counts
most There are different ways of treating DIR
ferent persons. A successful salesman OH tue
road knows that, and usually owes much OF his
successful selling to his knowledge OF now 10
approach customers. Ignorance OF their olsp0-
sitions and characteristics would mean failure
for him many times. Such knowledge comes
largely through training. which is nothing more
than experience. ~, a..
NAV NJ a little impatience or irritability at the
indecision OF a customer will send the latter
away without her making purchase SO as
gusted with that store that shs VIII not go theFe
again. . ,,,
But most important Of all is It for clerk
TO be tactful courteous and such good stuuehl
of men and women that he will know when q
few words adroity spoken in praise or an ar
ticle he is selling are proper and when TO main
tain silence. A sale is often MADE II the cie[A
zoos not annear too anxious to force the article
on the customer, when a continual reference to
the good qualities OF 1t would send an intending
purchaser away. These points are what every
clerlx should know intutively, and such lntul-
ton comes from experience or training