Are you a Shop Assistant looking for a great place to reach your full potential within charity retail?

At the National Animal Welfare Trust, we never stop caring for our animals and people.  As a rescue and rehoming charity, operating five rehoming centres and five shops across the south of England, we are committed to improving the lives of our communities’ pets, helping around 1,500 animals each year.

We need an enthusiastic Shop Assistant to join our friendly team at our Leighton Buzzard shop in Bedfordshire and make a difference.

Title:                         Shop Assistant

Location:                    Leighton Buzzard Shop, Bedfordshire

Salary:                         £10,793.64 per annum (£12.21 per hour)

Term:                          Permanent (3 Month Probationary Period)

Reports to:                 Shop Manager, Leighton Buzzard

About the role:

This position is 17 hours a week working full days on a Monday and Friday with a half day on a Wednesday, with the additional ad hoc hours required to cover holidays.

In this varied role, you will work closely with the Shop Manager ensuring targets and objectives are successfully met.  Full of pre-loved clothing, accessories, gifts and more, you will work collaboratively with volunteers to ensure excellent customer service. 

Some of your key responsibilities will include:

• Using your customer service skills to make sure our customers and supporters feel appreciated and can find what they need.
• Processing sales through the till.
• Overseeing the store and the shop volunteers in the Shop Manager's absence.
• Preparing large quantities of donated items for sale including the lifting, sorting, steaming and pricing of items to achieve optimum income.
• Using your creativity to help maintain attractive shop window displays. 
• Rotating stock between the shop and the storage container, involving daily lifting and moving of stock and transportation of donations.
• To identify higher value items to list on eBay.

About you:

You will have a positive, can-do attitude, be honest and reliable. You will be good humoured and have the customer and the charity at the heart of everything you do.  You will be commercially aware, driven and hands on to maximise profits, helping us to raise valuable funds. 

The successful candidate will have previous retail experience (ideally in a Charity Shop environment).  An understanding or an interest in fashion will be highly beneficial.  You will have good organisation and communication skills and will be provided with the opportunity to use your creativity.  A current UK driving license is essential.

As part of our commitment to making NAWT a great place to work, we offer access to the following employee benefits:

• 25 days annual leave plus statutory bank holidays (pro-rated for part time staff).
• Group Life Assurance.
• Contributory pension.
• Employee Assistance Programme and access to Wellbeing Resources.

So, if you have retail experience and are the kind of person who enjoys driving sales through great customer service, whilst knowing that the work you do helps our animals in need – this may be the job for you!

To apply please email your CV with covering letter to Debbie Page, Retail Area Manager at d.page@nawt.org.uk

The full Job Description can be viewed below. 

Please note we are accepting applications on a rolling basis and may close the recruitment process for this role prior to the deadline, so early applications are encouraged.