Museum Shop Sales Associate

Museum of Fine Arts•Boston, MA

1d•Onsite

About The Position

The Museum Shop Sales Associate provides sales and customer service in the Museum’s retail shops and front-line assistance to Museum visitors. The role involves explaining merchandise features and benefits, helping customers find products, promoting complementary items and Museum memberships, and answering questions about the Museum. Associates work across three shops and adapt to changing business needs and customer volumes. The position also supports merchandise receiving, stocking, displays, store upkeep, inventory preparation, and back-stock organization. Associates need general knowledge of store merchandise, Museum hours and policies, exhibitions, galleries, and the Museum collection, as well as basic art history knowledge. The Shops are open on weekdays and weekends, with evening hours on Thursdays and Fridays. The posting describes two part-time hourly positions, scheduled for two to four shifts per week.

Requirements

Must be able to work nights and weekends.
Outgoing and enthusiastic, with an enjoyment of sales and customer service.
Able to maintain high sales productivity and demonstrate strong interpersonal, closing, add-on sales, and membership-selling skills.
Organized and knowledgeable about the products being sold.
Able to support the Museum’s commitment to inclusion, diversity, equity, and accessibility and interact with audiences of diverse ages, economic statuses, and cultural backgrounds.
High school diploma required; college degree preferred.
Two to three years of related experience.
Able to read and interpret safety rules, operating and maintenance instructions, and procedure manuals; write routine reports and correspondence; and speak effectively before customer or associate groups.
Able to calculate figures and amounts including discounts, tax, proportions, percentages, area, circumference, and volume, and apply basic algebra and geometry.
Able to use common-sense judgment to follow written, oral, or diagrammatic instructions and handle problems involving several concrete variables in standardized situations.
Regularly able to stand, walk, use hands to handle or feel objects, reach, and talk or hear; occasionally able to sit, climb or balance, stoop, kneel, crouch, crawl, and taste or smell.
Regularly able to lift or move up to 25 pounds and occasionally up to 50 pounds.
Vision abilities include close, distance, and color vision, peripheral vision, depth perception, and focus adjustment.

Nice To Haves

College degree.
Basic art history knowledge.

Responsibilities

Process regular and membership sales using the register, ask customers whether they have a membership, and offer protective packaging for purchases.
Complete point-of-sale system training updates and keep register shortages and overages within the stated limit.
Greet customers warmly, remain approachable on the selling floor, and provide assistance as needed.
Adapt to changing business needs and process high volumes of customers and transactions accurately and efficiently while maintaining service quality.
Work in three different shops, potentially at different times during the same day.
Identify customer needs, explain merchandise features and benefits, recommend suitable and complementary products, and mention promotions.
Answer customer questions, seek supervisor assistance when needed, maintain a customer list, contact customers about new or restocked items, and take phone orders.
Check in, put away, restock, and fill in merchandise throughout the stores.
Assist floor merchandisers with stocking and re-merchandising, and create displays and integrate new merchandise under their direction.
Replenish supplies, keep work areas and stores neat, straighten merchandise, and maintain store standards by cleaning glass and dusting shelves.
Learn merchandise locations and product lines, including products related to the Museum’s collection, and communicate product information to customers.
Provide visitors with information about Museum hours, admission policies, exhibitions, galleries, and popular areas; hand visitors off to other staff or departments when appropriate.
Relate collection pieces to shop products where appropriate and suggest notable collection pieces when asked.
Organize and prepare for inventory and instruct newer associates on inventory preparation procedures.
Maintain a clean and organized back-stock and stock-room area.