Sales Associate with Business to Business (B2B) Sales Focus

Ace Hardware - Sales Associate with a Business-to-Business (B2B) Sales Focus

Are you passionate about building strong customer relationships and helping businesses find the right products and solutions? Do you thrive in a dynamic, fast-paced retail environment and enjoy connecting with customers to understand and meet their needs?

Ace Hardware, your local hardware store, is looking for a highly skilled and motivated full-time Sales Associate with a Business-to-Business (B2B) Sales Focus to join our team. In this role, you will build and maintain relationships with business customers, identify their needs, recommend products and solutions, and provide exceptional service to help grow our B2B customer base. You’ll also assist retail customers and contribute to a welcoming, positive shopping experience.

Join our team and be part of a friendly, enthusiastic group dedicated to serving our local business and residential communities.

The Sales Associate with a Business-to-Business (B2B) Sales Focus reports directly to the store manager with the primary responsibility of building, growing, and maintaining positive relationships with existing and new business customers to increase sales. They work in support of the outside sales rep or the sales manager. The person in this role is the trusted hardware consultant and advisor for local business customers to ensure they have the supplies they need to keep their business running.

This is a fast-paced active environment which will require focus, flexibility, and time management skills. In addition to being the main point of contact for business customers, this person is tasked with building B2B into the culture of the store. This entails building excitement and awareness with the staff, ensuring everyone is trained and understands their role in B2B and keeping B2B top of mind day to day by sharing success stories and celebrating wins.

• Provide exceptional customer service by being helpful, knowledgeable, and friendly at all times.
• Help unload incoming trucks and put away merchandise (as arranged by management).
• Maintain your assigned department:
  Keep all areas clean, organized and fully stocked.
• Actively participate in daily huddle meetings, share ideas for improvement with management. Be part of the team and participate in store communications and initiatives.
• Execute daily operational tasks accurately and efficiently as directed by store management.
• Participate in team meetings, share ideas for improvement, and contribute to store initiatives.
• Monitor merchandise displays, handle special orders, and prevent shoplifting through excellent customer interaction.
• Operate the cash register, process customer transactions accurately, and assist with cashiering duties as needed.

• Functions as the lead for Hunter Douglas Blinds Sales
• Trains and becomes an expert in Hunter Douglas Designs, Measuring, Ordering and Basic Installation Requirements
• Follows Hunter Douglas Special Ordering and Deposit workflows and procedures
• Works with installer for Hunter Douglas Blinds and follows up on completion of installation
• Expertly utilizes the Hunter Douglas platform.

• Capture business leads inside the store and convert them to business accounts.
• Collaborate with and refer leads to the sales manager or sales rep for further follow-up.
• Generate new leads and build relationships, connecting over the phone, in-store customer visits and/or in-store workshops and events.
• Actively reach out to customers over the phone for timely follow-up and completion of orders, providing excellent customer service.
• Research current and potential customers to understand their business and educate them on the value of working with Ace.
• Use monthly reports to identify and target specific customers who represent an opportunity for sales growth based on purchasing patterns and account variances.
• Works with sales manager and sales rep to maintain gross margin while negotiating commercial pricing to close B2B sales.
• Validate inventory levels to meet expectations set with business customers.
• Assist with the…