Be sure you use the proper cover letter format to make your cover letter readable and professional.
Retail Cover Letter Template (Text Format)
Contact Person’s Name
123 Company Address
Town
Postcode
07965 123 345
contactperson@gmail.com
Today’s Date
Dear [Mr/Ms/Mx] [Contact Person’s Name],
I’m writing to express my interest in the retail assistant role at [Website Name]. With more than five years of experience in retail environments, I’m confident I possess all the necessary qualifications to fulfil the role.
Working at Primark, I assisted 150+ customers daily, ensuring they each had a positive shopping experience. By interacting with our customers, I honed excellent interpersonal skills, along with conflict resolution techniques and time management skills. Moving up to a sales associate position at Burberry, I learnt how to develop and maintain professional relationships with clients. As you can see from my references, my exceptional upselling techniques have helped me attain the following achievements at Burberry:
- Voted the most popular sales assistant for two consecutive months
- Regularly maintained at least a 90% customer service feedback rating
- Exceeded sales goals by over 150% for two consecutive months
During university, I wrote a dissertation titled “Implementation of Effective Sales Strategies” that included interviews with five sales specialists, guides to point of sales software, and statistics describing the efficacy of different sales techniques. My dissertation was then picked up by the university newspaper and local businesspeople, and cited as “a fresh way to sell selling.”
Your job description offers an exciting role that suits my skills and experience, and I’m confident in my ability to increase your annual revenue in sales and improve the customer experience at your store. I’d be grateful for the opportunity to showcase my abilities further in an interview. I can be reached on 01911 135476 or at youremail@email.com.
Thank you for your time and consideration.
Best regards,
[Your Name]
How to write a retail cover letter
If you can maintain a positive attitude under stressful situations while keeping customers happy, you’re a great fit for a career in retail.
Retail is an exciting field that encompasses diverse roles, from visual merchandiser to customer success management. It can also be a great point of entry for careers in sales and marketing, especially if you have no experience or are writing a student CV.
Because of the various benefits that retail offers, it’s also a highly competitive industry. Therefore, you’ll need to write an effective cover letter to increase your chances of getting hired.
Build a standout cover letter in just a few clicks using our cover letter builder.
Follow these three tips to make a cover letter for a retail position that sells your skills and expertise:
1. Highlight your retail skills
A role in retail entails ensuring customers have a positive in-store experience while hitting your sales targets. Employers look for people who have a diverse blend of job-specific skills and personal traits to meet the demands of fast-paced retail jobs.
Show employers you’re the right person for the role by picking out skills mentioned in the job description and including them in your retail assistant cover letter. Including these key skills also helps your application pass applicant tracking systems (ATS) that filter out applications without the skills employers have added to their ATS.
Here’s a list of retail skills you can highlight:
- Communication skills
- Customer support skills
- Problem solving skills
- Time management
- Persuasiveness
- Active listening
- Calendar and scheduling software
- Inventory software
- Teamwork
- Critical thinking
- Sales skills
- Conflict resolution
- People skills
- Adaptability
- Multitasking
- Language skills
- Point of sale (POS) systems
- Negotiation
If you haven’t written your retail CV yet, do so to ensure you describe your skills properly on your CV as well.
2. Back up your retail achievements with numbers
Success in the retail industry is usually measured with numbers, so using numbers to quantify your achievements is an effective way to convey your expertise. Employers need to know that you can meet sales goals and get consistently good reviews from customers.
Quantifying your achievements in your cover letter also gives employers a sense of what they’ll gain from hiring you.
Here are some examples of how to express your retail achievements in numbers:
- Encouraged 80 new patrons to sign up for Burberry’s newsletter in one week
- Improved store’s inventory process, which increased store profits by 6% monthly
- Achieved an average of 180% of sales goals for six consecutive months
- Provided outstanding customer service, receiving 99% in customer service feedback surveys
- Voted the most popular sales assistant for two consecutive months
It’s vital to format your cover letter properly so that these hard numbers are placed to catch employers’ eyes.
3. End your retail cover letter with a strong closing paragraph
Your cover letter’s closing statement can make the difference between you getting an interview, and your application being turned down. Therefore, it’s important to end with a strong closing paragraph that emphasises your suitability for the specific job.
Here are a few questions you can answer in your closing statement:
- What about this job opportunity excites you the most?
- What are you looking forward to?
- What does the company have to gain from hiring you?
- Why did you choose the specific company?
You should also include a call to action (CTA) in your closing statement to encourage employers to reach out so you can discuss your qualifications further.
Lastly, follow your CTA with your phone number and email address so employers can easily contact you about your application.
Here’s an example of how to end your retail cover letter on a high:
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