The CEO of Lululemon defends the dismissal of employees who have confronted the display thieves
The company quotes its "zero tolerance policy" for how employees must act during a flight.
Rising Retail flight has become a major concern in the past year. Consequently, the large retailers have taken certain strict measures to prevent display flight, as Lock and even discovery stores In harder areas. But now a popular business is coming to the other side. Lululemon recently dismissed some of its employees after having confronted the display thieves in one of the retailer stores. Read the rest to know why the CEO of Lululemon doubles this controversial decision and defends the choice of the company.
Read this then: The Walgreens store prohibits handbags and bags to avoid display flight - others will follow?
Two Lululemon employees recently called the police on a group of shoplifting thieves.
Recently, two women from the Atlanta metro admitted to having called the police to report a flight while working at Lululemon in the city of Peachtree Corners. Jennifer Ferguson , who was the deputy director at the time, said local NBC 11alive that the incident involved several men who had run in the store with masks and hooded sweatshirts. "They slipped until they could no longer hold the product and get rid of the door," said Ferguson.
Rachel Rogers , which was a key leader for the Atlanta Lululemon store, told the location to be faced with flights like this for months. But unlike previous scenarios, Ferguson and Rogers decided to call the authorities after this group of display thieves hit their store. "We didn't really feel very protected or don't know what else to do," Rogers told the press.
But Ferguson admitted that the intervention in incidents like this is technically against the policy of the Lululemon company. "We are not supposed to hinder each other. You are in a way a clear path for everything they are going to do," she said. "And then, after the end, you scan a QR code. And that's it. We were told not to put it in any note, because it could frighten the others. We are not supposed to call the police, not Really supposed to talk about it. "
They said they had been dismissed accordingly.
A report by the Gwinnett police department confirmed that the three thieves who struck the corner of Peachtree Lululemon during this incident are now faced with accusations of theft of a crime. But Ferguson and Rogers said they were dismissed after the incident, and the two received the same reasoning for their dismissal: their choice to intervene. "It was not very clear. They did not give a specific reasoning in addition to saying that they have a" non-tole policy ", told Rogers to 11alive. Ferguson's response was almost the same: "They said I was immediately dismissed without compensation because they have a zero tolerance policy."
The two former employees said they thought it was not fair, they were dismissed and hoped that Lululemon can change its policy to allow employees to call the police if they do not feel safe.
But given new comments from the head of the company, it seems unlikely.
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The CEO of Lululemon now defends the dismissal Ferguson and Rogers.
Despite the frustrations of the two former employees, Lululemon seems to double his decision. In a Interview of June 2 On CNBC Squawk in the street , the CEO of the company Calvin McDonald Defended in dismissal both Ferguson and Rogers after calling the police on the three thieves in the state of the Peachtree City store. "We have a zero tolerance policy on which we form our educators to commit to a flight," said McDonald. ("Educators" are the way Lululemon refers to its employees.)
But McDonald also said that it was not the fact that they called the police who sent them back. "Unfortunately, in these situations, the educators knowingly broke the policy, have engaged with the thieves through several points, in particular by following them in the store ... This is what led to the termination," he said . "To be clear, our educators can call the police."
He said politics was in place for the security of his workers.
McDonald also defended the company's "zero tolerance policy", which clearly indicates that it is not planned to change it. Lululemon has these rules in place "because we put the security of our team, our guest, our before and our center," he said. "These are just goods." AE0FCC31AE342FD3A1346EBB1F342FCB
According to the CEO, retailer employees are trained to withdraw from the situation. They are told to let the flight occur because they have a technology and cameras in place that will allow them to work with local police after the flight.
"We take this policy seriously because we have had cases - and we saw with other retailers, cases - where the employees intervene and are injured, or worse, killed," said McDonald. "And politics is to protect them. But we have to support politics to apply it."
