Training Employees How To Offer the Marshall Field's Charge Card

A Marshall Field's charge card of more recent times

[According to various reports, Marshall Field & Company was the first business to offer revolving credit. This may have actually started with independent Chicago businessman Potter Palmer, prior to Palmer's partnership with Marshall Field and Levi Leiter to form Field, Palmer & Leiter, which eventually became Marshall Field & Company.]

New employees of Marshall Field's were given excellent training as regarded offering the Marshall Field's Charge Card to guests who didn't already have one, as well as asking current cardholders if they would like to use their Marshall Field's Charge to pay for their purchases. Because some employees might be shy in asking, they were trained as to all of the benefits which would be extended to the guests as a result, making it much easier to present the offer in a very customer-friendly manner. While the details of such benefits will be covered in a future post, a brief synopsis of the training will be given here.

Pictured below are the pages of a handy fold-out given to employees, with the easily memorable catchphrase, Ask Today Your Way. This approach took into account the fact that each employee had his/her own distinct personality, conversational style, and unique relationship with the guest(s). Employees could "be themselves" and remain personable using this more natural and preferable method rather than resort to using robotic, mechanical, and impersonal hard-sell tactics.