Zumiez Careers: Job Application and Interview Tips

Image by Mike Mozart from Flickr

Zumiez careers cover a wide variety of skillsets, including sales, management, marketing, graphic design, and more. There’s something for almost everyone.

However, Zumiez has a strong subcultural image. If you’re looking for an entry-level position such as CSR, it helps if you can already play the part.

People interested in skateboarding, snowboarding, or the fashion that goes along with these sports will have an easier time fitting in.

Why? Because that’s what Zumiez is all about.

Zumiez is a retail store that sells mainly clothes in addition to snow and skateboarding equipment, and accessories like hackysacks. You can think of them as the corporate version of your local mom and pop skate shop.

They were established in Seattle, WA, in 1978. Since then, they have grown to have hundreds of stores across North America.

Their focus is on casual streetwear such as t-shirts with pop culture references, jeans, backpacks, and skate shoes.

When visiting their shops or website, you’ll find popular brands like Vans, Champion, and Adidas. You’ll also see skate brands like Enjoi, Alien Workshop, Bird House, Element, and more.

Zumiez is well known for its enthusiastic staff who, unlike most other corporate jobs, are encouraged to dress and talk casually.

Their target customers include teenagers, parents of teenagers, and young adults.

When applying for Zumies careers, you should tailor your resume to the job you’re applying for.

Include a short paragraph explaining why you want the job and what makes you suited for it. Also have sections for skills, education, and work history.

List your work history in reverse chronological order; that is, newest to oldest. There are two schools of thought on resumes.

The first is to list all of your work history. The other is to list jobs in your career that apply to that which you are applying. Depending on your situation, you can decide which works best for you and the position you’re seeking.

If you are applying for an office job, highlight any higher education you have and any experience you have with computers. Use your work history to complement these skills if possible.

When you lack experience in a particular position, you can focus on transferrable skills.

For example, you may not have worked in a retail store that sells clothes before. However, maybe you worked in a fast-food restaurant where they taught you how to handle cash, upsell, and take inventory.

You can use infographics and special fonts conservatively to make your resume stand out and appear professional.

Interviewing is a skill within itself. More than anything, it’s about getting the interviewer to like you.

Knowing how to interview well for a sales job is doubly important because if you can’t sell yourself, how will you sell products?

Fortunately, there is a ton of information on the internet about how to interview well, including what you’ll find here.

Image by Zumiez from Flickr

Zumiez careers that involve working inside the store favor people who are good at sales.

They will likely hire you as a CSR to start and promote you based on merit. However, they may hire you as an assistant manager if you already have sales and management experience.

Customer sales representatives, or CSRs, exist to make sales.

There are seven steps to making a sale at Zumiez, and they are as follows:

1. Continue the experience
2. Create a conversation
3. Identify needs
4. PK (Product Knowledge)
5. Provide alternatives
6. Suggest add ons
7. Continue the experience

Being able to evaluate a customer’s needs quickly is vital to making sales.

They do this by utilizing sales techniques, which you’ll learn after they hire you. However, we’ll discuss them briefly to give you an edge in your interview.

If you feel you have mastered the sales techniques we discussed above, then you might consider applying to be an assistant manager.

In any case, you are more likely to get hired if the store manager knows you’re interested in being an AM.

Assistant managers must maintain good personal sales while focusing on a host of other responsibilities.

One of the primary aspects of a good assistant manager is the ability to train others. To do this, you must be patient yet clear and direct.

As an assistant manager, you will likely have to open and close the store. That means counting the registers and taking inventory, handling product returns and other special situations, and displaying clear attention to detail when cleaning.

Image from Pixabay

There are many Zumiez careers that don’t involve working in a retail store. In fact, some of them even allow you to work from home.

Unfortunately, most of these jobs go to people with degrees. However, it never hurts to apply even if you don’t have one.

What employers really want is proof that you know how to do the job and have a reputation for being reliable.

Here are a couple of the many jobs available:

Photo editing is a job that you can learn to do without a great deal of education.

As a photo editor, you take images that someone else photographed and make them look better. You do this mainly by cropping the image and correcting its color. The style of the images needs to be consistent.

Zumiez wants you to produce up to 100 images a day, so you have to be relatively fast. You’ll also learn the protocol for naming, uploading, and archiving the image.

To get this job, demonstrate your knowledge of Photoshop, Bridge, and Lightroom. Zumiez also requires that you have writing, communication, time management, and organizational skills.

Assistant buyers track and manage deliveries, as well as prepare sales reports. They assist in store to store transfers and oversee small categories and vendors.

Assistant buyers need at least one to three years of retail experience. Without a bachelors degree, they may require more experience.

They must show prowess in time management and organization, and understand retail math and business analysis.

Critical thinking skills are a must, as are verbal and written communication skills, and attention to detail.

Knowledge of Microsoft office is also necessary.

Digital merchandisers are one of the Zumiez careers that have you work with the online store manager to create a positive customer experience for online shoppers.

As a digital merchandiser, you would be responsible for categorizing products based on their brand, attributes, discounts, and more.

You would sort products according to their sales trends, and work with the sales team to organize events, promotions, collections, collaborations, etc.

Optimizing search engine results and ensuring product pages are complete with photography and attributes would likely fall to you.

In addition to all of this, you’d have to be knowledgable and flexible enough to handle whatever else they throw at you.

Zumiez requires you have one to three years in retail buying or online merchandising experience, and prefers a business degree.

Experience includes knowledge of retail math, categorization, sequencing, promotions, digital analytics, and Microsoft office.

Now that you’ve had a look at Zumiez careers and ways to get through the hiring process, it’s time to apply. No one ever got hired without first taking action!

But first, can you think of other ways to stand out from other applicants? Which Zumiez careers appeal to you? Let us know in the comments below!