Information about the roles of Furniture Shop Manager and Support Worker The role is being recruited to provide management for our new Furniture shop within our main source of income generation: our Retail Division.
The Retail Division: The charity runs 12 independent charity shops established to generate income to support our charitable activities. Our established shops are located in the County: Clay Cross, Alfreton, Wirksworth, Matlock, Matlock Bath, Duffield, Belper, Heanor, and in the city in Alvaston, Littleover, Mickleover. To provide support to our shops we have a warehouse and stock van co-located with the furniture shop. The warehouse sorts and stores donations and handles reclaim stock and recycling as well as providing shops with sales resources. It now provides a quarantine storage and sorting facility to manage Covid 19 risks. Each shop has a part-time manager, some have an assistant and all have a team of volunteers to fulfil a staffing rota. Most shops are all decorated and presented in a corporate style using the bright Age UK colour palette. Our concept shops have a different look and feel.
Our new Furniture Shop is our latest venture. The premises will combine warehousing for our general charity shops and provide a small amount of clothes and general charity shop stock within the furniture shop as local feedback suggests this would be welcomed by the local community. In addition to the warehouse space the premises will provide a base for our Handyman, PAT testing for small electrical appliances and some general storage. The furniture shop is part of a converted pub formerly ‘The Blue Boy’ on Wiltshire Road, Chaddesden, Derby. The site has customer parking, and our units have a delivery and loading bay, staff kitchen and toilets and storage space for various activities. The furniture shop is well located for access from Derbyshire via the A38 and Derby residents via the ring road giving us good opportunities for customers and donations.
The shops are primarily a source of charitable income but they are also an opportunity to reduce waste, re-use and recycle supporting our environmental policy. The shops are also our window to the world, providing in-reach to local communities. The shops each have an information hub, can promote local services and events and each year they support our influencing campaigns with shop-window displays.
Work Base: Furniture Shop, Wiltshire Road, Derwent, Derby.
The Roles: The Furniture Shop Manager role is busy and requires energy and enthusiasm. Growing and leading a small team of volunteers is enjoyable but sometimes demanding. Volunteers all give skills, experience, time and energy but also take all these things. Managing volunteer’s expectations and meeting their needs is an important part of the role and helping them help us to create a high-performing shop.
The Furniture Shop Support Workers will work together to safely manage the manual handling of stock donations and deliveries. Under the direction of the Manager they will work as a team in all aspects of keeping the shop stocked, stock prepared and attractively displayed and in achieving targets.
The day to day tasks for the Manager involve receiving donations, processing stock and refuse/waste, increasing value from gift aid, merchandising and displays, promoting sales, delivering fundraising activity and following processes for managing money, volunteers, premises and risk. But within these tasks the role offers great opportunities for creativity and people skills.
A key element of the Furniture Shop staff roles is the moving and handling required to prepare items for sale, position them in the shop and move them for delivery to customer’s homes. There will be considerable manual handling required frequently through each day. The Furniture Shop will have a pair of Furniture Shop Support Workers to drive the shop van, collect donations and deliver purchased items to customers.
Our shops are very much part of their local community, for volunteers, donors and customers the shop is often a key part of their routine and social interaction. Our shops must be friendly and supportive parts of our communities and great places to drop into and find a bargain, information or a friendly smile.
Support: All staff and volunteers have induction time, training and support to make sure you feel confident in your role and settle into our organisation. Throughout your work with us there is regular training and development opportunities and all staff and volunteers can support our fundraising and charitable services.
We have a dedicated Retail Manager to support you, helping to ensure you achieve your potential and the shop meets its targets. The role is supportive and the Retail Manager will work with you to help you implement best practice and identify areas for improvement; but our shops need to continuously improve and succeed and the Retail Manager will have appropriate expectations for you. We don’t set up anyone to fail but we do expect our staff to work hard and well bringing energy and efficiency to their work.
Our Retail Support Worker will help train volunteers in some key areas including Gift Aid, health and safety and fire safety. In addition both the Retail Manager and the Retail Support Worker will create opportunities for Managers and volunteers to have specialist training in skills such as merchandising, promotional events, and community engagement.
Our charity is full of some amazing staff and volunteers who love what they do. We work together, helping each other and making sure older people and the people who love them are centre stage.