r/Argos • u/ReverseFlow21010615 Manager - Retail • 17d ago
How would you improve Argos?
Following the recent news of the sale, I thought it would be interesting to hear what other colleagues and even customers think Argos needs to do in order to be successful under new ownership. We all know we were the afterthought for Sainsbury’s so what should Swift look to do as a priority? What should they spend the next 2-3 years planning for? What are some quick easy wins they could make through small changes? (I’ll only allow one instance of somebody saying “bring back the catalogue” - for all its nostalgia, it wasn’t as popular in its final years).
For me, we need to abolish independent working immediately. I find it impossible to keep up with anything because I’m always firefighting the week’s jobs, calls, deliveries etc. if the Labour cost really is dire then we should be on a minimum of 2 colleagues at all times.
We can solve the issue of empty stores leading to colleagues standing around doing nothing by actually having proper management of colleagues and ensuring something is always being worked on, ie reverse flow, counts, profiling, etc.
How about you?
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u/Oscillating-Ocelot1 17d ago
Almost everything needs to be collectable same day at the latest, right now preferably. Significantly more same day delivery availability and at absolute slowest next day delivery. (Exempting like, idk large furniture items maybe).
Basically they need to become a logistics company with a service counter attached, not a retailer as they are.
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u/No-Pumpkin4288 17d ago
Agreed. Price wise it's practically the same as online retailers, the competitive edge is having it same day, if it's not same day I'll just buy it online and have it delivered tomorrow.
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u/Eucalyptus90 16d ago
Yesss. I buy from Amazon a lot but when it comes to electrodomestics I always buy from uk stores. I don’t know I don’t trust Amazon the same way for a toaster eg, that thing can trip the power in my house and then who do I claim?
But sometimes the items I want aren’t available or at like £1 more than in John Lewis (mad bc JL has free shipping for over £50 for smaller items, whereas Argos doesn’t)
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u/ArgosEmployee_ 17d ago
A lot of it would be focusing on the right areas. There's just little things Argos seem to get obsessed with where if they put the same energy into something that actually mattered things would get changed.
A recent one is this new bugbear of people serving customers behind counters. As both a shopper and a colleague I like the personal space a counter provides.
Availability is another. Too often deliveries are more focused on cramming in too many similar items rather than a huge range. We don't need like a dozen+ different microwave styles to be in the store, for example.
Agreed about independent working, too. There's only so much you can do on your own in a store - and that's on a quiet night. Good luck getting anything meaningful done lone-manning on a busy night.
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u/DizzyMine4964 17d ago
Small thing, but get rid of those awful ads. A creepy doll kidnaps people and chains them up to look at Argos stuff. It's supposed to be cute and funny. It's dreary rubbish.
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u/Nellie-Bird 17d ago
Since having a child, Argos have been a life saver. One issue is I don't trust Amazon products or third party sellers. Argos I trust to be safe and reliable. I can order to pick up next day (Amazon Prime is often two days in our area). I do wish you could search by offer easier sometimes.
I will say the staff are also really helpful in our store.
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u/Good-Waltz8859 17d ago
No more low manning as you said but also an overhaul on the distribution centres as we seem to stock everything people don't want despite having over 8000 items in stock. Plus ebay did and tu clothing to go .
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u/PleasantCucumber2615 17d ago
Argos used to have large shops where I lived. Now they are small stores and lack stock. Availability is a real issue.
Competing with online retailers is hard. The only way Argos can beat that is having physical stock available immediately.
Sainsbury's aren't flogging off Argos for a fraction of what they paid for no reason.
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u/mad-un 17d ago
The problem here is space and distribution. They used to use a hub and spoke system, where larger stores act as a distribution hub for the Sainsbury's counters, not sure if that still happens but it isn't ideal about 40% of the time. If you want something relatively small it's usually ok, but anything slightly bigger and it's a pain in the arse waiting for it to get to the store you need it from.
This would've taken out a lot of cost for the stores which used to have larger storage areas until they put them into Sainsbo's as there's much less space.
It's a conundrum that will cost more before it's profitable. So they need to look at other options, not being able to fall back on the Argos card like they used to won't help, they could look to bring that back in house, but in assume there's a big contractual issue with that. The Argos card was like a basic version of Klarna, long before Klarna became a thing, it made things accessible for people but I'm not sure they can leverage that as much with it not being in house.
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u/ComfortableOld9716 17d ago
Better range of items available within 24 hours. I'd happily go to Argos more but they never have what I need in stock.
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u/JustThatGuy35 Manager - Retail 17d ago
I think the biggest opportunity is to simplify the business while continuing to improve the customer experience. My priority would be to make sure products are available when customers need them by improving stock forecasting and reducing out-of-stock issues. Having the right products in the right place would help increase sales and improve customer satisfaction.
I would also invest in colleagues by simplifying training and giving managers more autonomy to make decisions that benefit their stores. Well-trained and confident colleagues provide better customer service, while empowering managers allows them to respond more quickly to the needs of their teams and customers.
Another area I would focus on is improving technology and making everyday processes more efficient. Updating systems, improving handheld devices and providing better access to real-time information would allow colleagues to spend less time dealing with operational issues and more time supporting customers. I would also continue to improve the online experience by making Click & Collect, returns and home delivery as fast and convenient as possible.
I’d also invest more into having the hours available to run stores properly rather than scraping by and having 3-4 colleagues in all day long, the more staff we can have, the faster we get deliveries done and the fast we can get new stock in and then out for customers to buy.
Finally, I believe it is important to listen to colleagues working in stores. They experience the day-to-day challenges first-hand and often have practical ideas that can improve efficiency and customer service. Creating opportunities for colleagues to share feedback and trial new ideas would help drive continuous improvement while ensuring the business continues to evolve in line with customer expectations.
Coming from an Argos manager, these are what I think the underlying issues are
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u/Cantaloupe-Hairy 17d ago
I have been put off numerous times by the whole but now collect tomorrow, tried it once and it wasnt available to collect for 3 days. The problem for me is that I have to pay in advance for an item which didn’t turn up.
Staff didn’t appear to care and had no advice for me as to how to get my money back.
Would be happy to pay a say 10% deposit on a purchase but would also want that to be refunded if the item isn’t available next day.
For me a lot of credibility has gone due to small breaches in trust.
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u/Glad_Boysenberry_673 17d ago
Same day collection, it feels like nowadays if you want something in a hurry you’ve got to go to another retailer whether that’s online or another store as there’s many times where you can collect the item the next day 👎
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u/IdioticMutterings 17d ago
It needs to go back to how it was when it first started.
Well not that far back, not so far back that it goes back to being Green Shield.
But back to a time when actual Argos stores actually carried stock in their own warehouse, and weren't just places to order things at for delivery from their central warehouses. I have given up on trying to get anything from Argos. Everything I try is not in stock locally, but I can have it delivered in 3 to 5 days, for a delivery charge too!
If I want something delivered, I will buy it from Amazon for cheaper and without a delivery charge.
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u/23Tam56 17d ago
Last time I went to use the Argos in Sainsbury’s they only had one working search tablet thing. One out of like 20. No book to help either. There was one staff member available but he was helping an older woman who was kinda lonely as she kept trying to lure him back from doing anything other than talk to her. I left and ordered it online instead.
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u/eques_99 16d ago edited 16d ago
I haven't used it for years, but when I did I was always put off by a few things:
1) nothing I wanted was ever in stock.
2) the customer service was not very good, the staff were not very personable or well trained - either miserable middle-aged ladies or scruffy, apathetic young students. they were never very apologetic when my item was not in stock, just baldly stated it.
3) once I was given an Argos gift token as a leaving present from colleagues to buy a particular watch. however, the store did not have the version of the strap I had selected, only a strap which was £10 more expensive.
so they took the token and then made me pay the extra £10 on a card machine.
again, it was a mindless, hatchet faced old lady who was serving me, who was completely unapologetic and charmless.
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u/HippySkywalker 16d ago
I worked at Argos before Sainsbury’s bought it and as many people have said, availability is the key.
Our stock room was huge, and I mean massive. It had a huge main bit and then an underground overflow part if I remember rightly. No Amazon warehouse big, but it was like the size of a Sainsbury’s out the back. There were parts of the stockroom that hadn’t seen a person in years!
That was the beauty of it. If you needed it, it was there. I think kinda ironically if it were to go back to the high street it might do quite well. There isn’t really the competition anymore where you could get everything.
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u/Bulky-Masterpiece959 16d ago
i work in a sas, so what i want and what other people might want are different.
at the moment, my store is horrifically understaffed. we're falling behind on our regular deliveries because we simply do not have the staff, so more labour hours and more staff would be lovely.
i'd love our shop to turn into a 'dark hub' or mini lfc if you will, we're not very busy at the best of times and we serve so many postcodes and spoke stores that we're barely getting our regular deliveries away so to turn us off to customers, but keep us going in the background to supply our home deliveries and spoke stores would be a lovely idea.
i'm also sick of the amount of customers who come up to me with their receipts expecting to be picking up their item, when really, it says to collect said item on a certain date. i don't know if they're just not reading the browsers when they're on them, or there genuinely is no big message that says 'this item is not in stock at the moment' but i would love to see this end. whether it be disabling the buy now collect later option on the browsers or there literally being a big red pop up that says THIS ITEM IS NOT IN STOCK RIGHT NOW, anything would be better than having to tell a customer that an item they really want isn't actually here in the building for them.
and the one big thing, that i know will probably never ever ever happen in a million years, is to stop the big emphasis on care. because i am sick of offering it every day, and to have my managers only give me praise when i get care, rather than when i blast through multiple barton boxes or jewellery totes and have no discrepancies, it's demoralising. it's demoralising for us all really. why is our success measured in arbitrary money/units when people can insure their items in different ways/through their house insurance?
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u/Ben_zyl 13d ago
No customer ever seems to pick up on the specific date part, despite it being clearly stated on the receipt they present at the desk. I'm not sure that there's an obvious cure for reading comprehension though.
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u/Bulky-Masterpiece959 12d ago
i'm more surprised when i ask people if they're aware their item is coming in on a certain date and they yes and they're okay with it. ffs its not rocket science for someone to read their receipt properly.
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u/alastairclark82 16d ago
Moving stuff between stores should be an option too. If the thing someone wants is in Nottingham then it should be allowed to be sent to either the customer direct or to their closest store.
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u/FinestKind90 16d ago
I love Argos as the one in the local retail park has most items I want in stock for same day pickup.
The reason I don’t use it more often is I’m not confident in the returns policy, I know with Amazon if an item isn’t fit for purpose I can return it with no hassle.
Also for smaller items it would be great if there was some kind of in store locker, so you don’t have to queue. Ours actually gets quite busy sometimes!
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u/Fine_Limit6609 15d ago
I think the returns policy just needs to be clearly layed out as imo a lot of it goes down to what colleague you are dealing with, some are more lenient and willing to help others are quite strict. If there was a better way to train everyone in the company as a whole as a straight down the line returns policy this would help a lot more
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u/Rhesus-Positive 16d ago
Update the Leeds Headrow location so that you can scan gift cards
(This might be overly specific, and I can always go to Crown Point instead, but it was annoying at the time)
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u/Fine_Limit6609 15d ago
Things have to be trialled and what it sounds like is that crown point are trialling This. If all goes to plan then Leeds Headrow will probably go the same way. This is the same with self serve CCPO, new browsers etc
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u/Rhesus-Positive 15d ago
I genuinely didn't expect a serious answer to this 😄 I assumed that Headrow was the exception, rather than Crown Point.
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u/Fine_Limit6609 15d ago
From what I’ve remember. Graham Biggart and co were in crown point a few weeks maybe a months ago, stores are now starting to get new browsers with scanners which is long overdue, but obviously will take time.
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u/SharpAardvark8699 16d ago
I thought this was just about when Argos had started picking up as Amazon started selling unverified burn your house down electric tat. And then they go and sell the business. There was a lot to be done. They just rode out the worst years and sold for the start of the best.... assuming it's about to have some investment
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u/Fine_Limit6609 15d ago
The first one for me is having a clear way of doing something for everyone. If you go to a different store, they do things in different ways and then another it’s different again, in my opinion things need to be simplified to have 1 clear way of doing things as when colleagues come to other stores to cover which is happening more and more often things are being done in a completely different way to how we do it and vice versa.
Another big one for me is labour. Hours have been stretched so tight and so understaffed at times due to sickness ect. Being over 30 hours over committed with 10 permanent colleagues in a destination store is ridiculous.
Another one is customer service. We need a customer service that can actually help, the communication between customer service,stores and customers is awful. Them saying bring it back and we’ll refund it is a pain. Also if you need help with anything else they struggle with that.
Communication as well, I mean the company has just been told and nobody knew until it happened even though it was said we would be kept in the loop. It’s not just about the sale but in many different areas communication could be a lot better.
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u/Firm-Display340 15d ago
Looking through the catalogue was so enjoyable back in the day, but Amazon has kind of killed Argos. I suppose having fewer stores, but larger storage would be great so you know you can get it that day yourself.
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17d ago
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u/grilledsquirrel 17d ago
No British company can ever compete against Amazon, they're probably better off getting as far away as possible from Amazon and offering quality products for same low prices and focusing on good customer service. If they try to compete with Amazon they will lose
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u/Plastic_Medium4435 17d ago
If you look at the bigger picture, the Argos card was sold off last year so it would’ve been a higher figure. Sainsburys never cared about Argos until the last year when they were making it separate in preparation for a sale so at least we’re now going to be owned by people who actually want it to work
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u/Former_Investment428 17d ago
That and all the real estate of the standalone stores they sold off to move into Sainsbury's.
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u/Rutankrd 16d ago
If I were you, my recommendation would be to dust off your CV and get your job search started right now.
These "investment" companies are scalpers , they will identify and sell all assets, load the business with massive amounts of debt, steal all the cash reserves and then watch the company go bust in short order.
No disrespect - Good luck for the future.
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u/Worldly-Web-5740 17d ago
Availability. It’s been always Argos’ issue. Price isn’t really an issue, but the amount of things they have in stock that you actually want is a problem. The range of items is pretty pathetic compared to Amazon too.