When I first landed my job as visual merchandiser at the garden center in Houston, I thought I was the luckiest person in the world. I just couldn't believe that someone was willing to pay me to hang out around plants all day and do displays, but not have to deal with customers or work weekends. The first year was a bit rough. I hadn't done this for a nursery before, and they had never had a merchandiser before, and weren't really sure what they wanted. The manager would ask us me to do one thing, then the owner would flit in and tell me to do the opposite. The next day she would change her mind. Each department head was accustomed to doing their own thing, and it was not at all unusual for me to spend the day reworking the gift shop, only to return a couple of days later and find that a certain someone had put everything right back the way she had it. The maintenance manager wouldn't even speak to me the first couple of years, just grunt, and there was rarely anyone available to help me move the heavy stuff. They were only willing to pay me to work 10-15 hours a week, so I used the rest of my time to build up a garden design business on the side, and to haunt every garden-related shop I could find, in order to figure out what a well-merchandised nursery was supposed to look like.
I kept on plugging away, and eventually most of them came around. I think they started grooving on the positive feedback they were getting from the customers, and decided it was more fun to work with me than against me. I kept hoping to get some feedback from the owner, but that rarely happened. She never seemed to notice anything we had accomplished, only that which we hadn't. Still, business was increasing slowly but surely, and we were getting good reports from the marketing consultant that came in periodically. One day, out of the blue, the owner invited me to begin accompanying the shop manager on her buying trips. Surely I must have been doing something right.
In the meantime, we bought this house in the Hill Country, and I became obsessed with writing. As we spent more and more time here, it became harder and harder to find time for my design clients, and I eventually let that business go. After five years at the nursery, with only one fifty cent raise (which I had to beg for), and still no signs of approval from the owner, I was getting extremely frustrated. I was getting less and less satisfaction from my efforts there, more and more from my time spent writing. I found it particularly irritating that she would never allow my name and picture to be included in the employee section of our website. My friends would ask "Are you sure you really work there? I think you are making it up!" When I inquired about it, she claimed that if customers knew who I was, they would pester me so much I would never get any work done, but one of my co-workers said "Nah, she's just afraid someone would steal you away." I was dumb-struck. "You mean she's actually pleased with my work? Why doesn't she ever say so?" "That's just the way she is," they replied. I discovered exactly what they meant when she decided that I should be included in the weekly manager's meetings. Although it was somewhat comforting to find that it wasn't just me who failed to live up to her expectations, but the entire world, it was also disheartening to realize that no matter how hard I worked, I would never get any reaction from her other than "Why haven't you done this?" or "When are you going to do that?" Still, buying trips to Dallas, New York and Atlanta, can make up for a lot.
A new manager started on Monday (the fourth since I've been there - they never stick around for long). Whenever that happens, the owner always goes into an expense-cutting frenzy, to compensate for the manager's salary, so I wasn't too surprised when she told several of us that we should go ahead and start our (unpaid) holiday early. On my way out the door, she stopped me. I thought she was going to say "Have a nice holiday!" or maybe even, at last "Good job on transforming the nursery for Christmas. Thanks." Silly me. Instead she said "By the way. I don't think we really need to go to market this year, do you? I don't see why we can't just order what we need on line." And that was it. She didn't even say good-bye. So, I owe her a huge debt of gratitude, for she has made it so much easier for me to finally leave the nursery behind, and actually start living the good life, instead of just reading about it!
I kept on plugging away, and eventually most of them came around. I think they started grooving on the positive feedback they were getting from the customers, and decided it was more fun to work with me than against me. I kept hoping to get some feedback from the owner, but that rarely happened. She never seemed to notice anything we had accomplished, only that which we hadn't. Still, business was increasing slowly but surely, and we were getting good reports from the marketing consultant that came in periodically. One day, out of the blue, the owner invited me to begin accompanying the shop manager on her buying trips. Surely I must have been doing something right.
In the meantime, we bought this house in the Hill Country, and I became obsessed with writing. As we spent more and more time here, it became harder and harder to find time for my design clients, and I eventually let that business go. After five years at the nursery, with only one fifty cent raise (which I had to beg for), and still no signs of approval from the owner, I was getting extremely frustrated. I was getting less and less satisfaction from my efforts there, more and more from my time spent writing. I found it particularly irritating that she would never allow my name and picture to be included in the employee section of our website. My friends would ask "Are you sure you really work there? I think you are making it up!" When I inquired about it, she claimed that if customers knew who I was, they would pester me so much I would never get any work done, but one of my co-workers said "Nah, she's just afraid someone would steal you away." I was dumb-struck. "You mean she's actually pleased with my work? Why doesn't she ever say so?" "That's just the way she is," they replied. I discovered exactly what they meant when she decided that I should be included in the weekly manager's meetings. Although it was somewhat comforting to find that it wasn't just me who failed to live up to her expectations, but the entire world, it was also disheartening to realize that no matter how hard I worked, I would never get any reaction from her other than "Why haven't you done this?" or "When are you going to do that?" Still, buying trips to Dallas, New York and Atlanta, can make up for a lot.
* * * * *
A new manager started on Monday (the fourth since I've been there - they never stick around for long). Whenever that happens, the owner always goes into an expense-cutting frenzy, to compensate for the manager's salary, so I wasn't too surprised when she told several of us that we should go ahead and start our (unpaid) holiday early. On my way out the door, she stopped me. I thought she was going to say "Have a nice holiday!" or maybe even, at last "Good job on transforming the nursery for Christmas. Thanks." Silly me. Instead she said "By the way. I don't think we really need to go to market this year, do you? I don't see why we can't just order what we need on line." And that was it. She didn't even say good-bye. So, I owe her a huge debt of gratitude, for she has made it so much easier for me to finally leave the nursery behind, and actually start living the good life, instead of just reading about it!
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