1.3 million people are employed in the retail industry across Australia. This equates to about 10% of the overall Australian workforce. In the retail sector, your staff are as critical to your brand as your product. In the retail sector, your staff are as critical to your brand as your product.

If you’re a bricks and mortar retailer, your floor staff, their presentation, approach and behaviour can confirm your value proposition, and influence a buyer’s perception of your brand.

Have you also considered how your organization’s and your workers approach and attitude to workplace safety is an important part of your brand’s image? 

Every year sees 10,500 serious injuries in the retail sector, so it’s important to make it a focus of your business.

For retailers with bricks and mortar, the approach to in-store safety is paramount to reduce and mitigate injury to workers and the public.

If you have an injury in-store, you can almost guarantee that it will be publicized by joe public on social media (possibly even before your health and safety representative has been notified) and your brand will suffer damage as social media cannot be controlled or manipulated, no matter how much time and money you spend on it.

This is without even thinking about the direct cost to the business around medical expenses, claims and insurance premium review.

For online retailers, there is an expectation for reliable delivery times in-store or direct, so safe work practices are critical as any incidents, accidents or failing safety inspections will impact your ability to maintain expected turnaround times – again, a potential impact on brand perception.

As a workforce compliance and safety specialist, we’ve made it our business to help you to deliver robust, relatable and timely worker safety information and inductions.

We’ve also made it our business to keep an eye on great programs and initiatives globally that are available to help you to keep your workforce safe, reduce injuries and give you ideas to make safety part of your everyday work life.

And on that, Worksafe Victoria has published a great resource for retailers, which can be accessed here.

So what makes up a great retail safety induction? It’s important to make sure that your induction covers every aspect of the retail experience, as well as strongly representing your brand.