Sales Reps ,sales managers

[jvr]

Being a sales rep myself, going forward where do we stand as regards going back to work.
Let's say that shops are open sales reps have to travel distance, stay over night and I travel most of the country.
So the question is where do we stand as to a return to work in the nearish future?
Other problems would also be meeting client's.
Thoughts
P

[crofty1984]

Right now I'm WFH. To be honest I think it'll be a real struggle to get to see clients. Unless you're going for a specific job or request, I can't see that many places would welcome a pure sales call. Hotels will be an issue too I think. I have a colleague still allowed to travel (he's a fitter) and he's having real trouble finding hotels.

[TheHighlander]

I'm a Business Dev Manager, I was working from home but we have all just been office based.

I'm the only one for our area (North of Scotland) I thought I was going to get furloughed but was told I wouldn't be.

I go off for 3 weeks tomorrow as the wife is giving birth Wed/Thursday so happy day.

[jazzybee]

I'm sales covering Europe - normally a couple of European trips every two weeks. My last trip was to Germany in late Jan... have been working from home since - all meetings now on Zoom and I have been closing deals. In the run up to lockdown people did not want to have external staff in their offices and I think it will be the same for a while. I have had to change how I normally work as I am pretty good at 'reading' a room but its a bit more challenging on Zoom. Also going after slightly different/adjacent markets as my core markets have been hit hard. Deals in play have been closing though, for which I am very thankful.

[TheHighlander]

I'm in the same boat, our client base has dropped 50% but from the other 50% we're still hitting where we need to be which is great.

Like yourself I find it easy to read a room in person but on zoom it can be a bit more challenging, it's changed times. I've found out for tomorrow I'm going to do a site visit to look at a critical piece of kit so it's a nice 5hr round trip for me tomorrow so an easy day to wrap up my last day for a few weeks.

I think it will be a couple of months until we're back to doing proper visits like we used to but will see what happens.

[jvr]

You see my issue is that I have to visit shops to get orders to top up the stand for stock. My remit is to do that,
Shops are opening soonish but will they want yo see anyone plus travelling round country be allowed?

[ziggy328]

jvr said:

You see my issue is that I have to visit shops to get orders to top up the stand for stock. My remit is to do that,
Shops are opening soonish but will they want yo see anyone plus travelling round country be allowed?

There's no difference between you going into the shop to a customer entering the shop. Maintain 2m and you will be fine. From Weds, travel, in England, no issues.

[spikeyhead]

jvr said:

You see my issue is that I have to visit shops to get orders to top up the stand for stock. My remit is to do that,
Shops are opening soonish but will they want yo see anyone plus travelling round country be allowed?

Get the shop to send you a photo of the stand and work from that?

[jvr]

spikeyhead said:

Get the shop to send you a photo of the stand and work from that?

Good idea, might work for some of them, but others require that 'personal touch'
Combo of both is worth a thought though
Cheers

[crofty1984]

Voo