Automotive Retail Sales

Are You Right for the Job?
All in a Day's Work

Colleen MacRae - Winnipeg, Manitoba - "Canadian Tire"

"You need that part when?" -- "It was not at all my childhood ambition," Colleen MacRae says of her job as an automotive parts sales person. "The fact is, I was never really a car person."

Little wonder her colleagues initially thought she was "just another woman who doesn't know anything about cars." But while she was short on experience, Colleen was a quick learner. She says it didn't take long to change their minds about what she could do. "They know that when they ask for a starter, I won't bring them an alternator."

Colleen says a retail parts person like her, can work throughout the automotive industry, wherever automotive parts are sold.

Career Path

Colleen came to her job with a high school diploma and experience working in retail sales, and in supply jobs in the Armed Forces. Canadian Tire originally hired her as a warehouse supervisor but later offered her a job as an automotive service advisor. She took on the challenge, taking several of the mini-courses Canadian Tire provides as on-the-job training. She was soon promoted to the parts department, taking an eight-module self-study course on technical and product knowledge being certified as a "Parts Pro." She also took a short course on tires.

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Are You Right for the Job?

An automotive retail sales person should:

•  have good product knowledge
•  have excellent people skills
•  have a mechanical mind
•  be able to work quickly under pressure

While she has worked primarily with auto service technicians during her two and a half years in auto parts sales, Colleen also does some retail customer service. Both aspects of the job require the same training, she says.

Because everything is now computerized, Colleen says that it is easier being an auto partsperson than it was in the past. "Before, you had to search for parts on microfiche or in huge printed catalogues."

Colleen says she's convinced that working as a partsperson is a good career option for young people. "There are lots of job opportunities with automobile dealerships, aftermarket auto parts stores, and auto recyclers."

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All in a Day's Work:

Immediately on starting work, Colleen turns on her computers and checks to see if any notes have been left for her to source needed parts. Sourcing parts involves checking for price and availability of items Canadian Tire doesn't handle or doesn't have in stock at the moment. It can also involve getting used parts from auto recyclers.

Up to seven times a day, stock can arrive from the central warehouse. When parts arrive, she contacts whoever ordered them and does the necessary billing paper work. She bench tests components such as alternators and batteries and deals with battery and tire warranty problems.

In addition to juggling all of the above, she also serves any new customers who appear at her counter.

Colleen says she's still not a "car person" who can tell a Mustang from a Camaro a block away, but she can efficiently check your battery or provide you with new ball joints or CV boots. And she enjoys doing it.

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