Shop Girl

When there was a necessary financial lull in the renovations of our large house, my husband and I thought I should find a small part-time job. I stumbled across an ad for a “perfume model”.  Friendliness and ability to stand long hours on one’s feet were the only requirements listed. And since I had loved fragrance since my grandmother let me sample her favorite perfume when I was eight years old, I was excited.

The interview took place in a tidy little office building. I was interviewed by a very pretty and willowy former model who owned the agency that provided models of all kinds to the local department stores. She was very kind as she checked me over and quickly reassured me that my height had nothing whatsoever to do with working as a perfume model. She cared only that I was prepared to dress appropriately and walk around the department store for approximately 6 hours a day.

The former model explained that looking clean and attractive was essential as was being able to carry a glass perfume bottle, often decorated with ribbons and netting and be able to seek out both men and women to sample whichever perfume I would be peddling that day. We were also to wear fresh floral corsages that were brought in every morning in pristine white boxes for all of the “models”. My interviewer repeatedly emphasized the importance of wearing an attractive dress (no separates).

This job was before women carrying perfume accosted shoppers and sprayed fragrance at them. I wouldn’t have been able to do that. Instead, we strolled around the cosmetic counters, embellished bottle in hand, big smile on our lips, and asked shoppers if they wanted to sample the perfume. Each time we worked, we were given a different perfume to sell so that we never felt loyal to any brand although I quickly found my favorites. And of course, there were commissions – if a bottle we were carrying ended in a sale, we received an extra very-small stipend in our paychecks.

On my first day, I wore a pink vertical pin-striped dress with puff sleeves. It had a sewn-in upside down “V” from the neck to the waist where it was cinched with a fabric belt. Because of the “V”, my husband always referred to the dress as my “Star Trek Dress”. I also wore comfortable but chic small-heeled sandals which quickly became the only shoes that would help me survive the store’s hardwood floors for hours at a time.

We were primed each morning about the perfume we were modeling by the counter manager and soon I learned lots of new phrases such as top-note, dry-down, and silage. It didn’t take long to understand most perfume.

Mostly we sampled on women and most of them bought a bottle if you were kind enough and smiled and infused a little bit of perfume lore upon them. I was good at this and I earned commissions every week. Unfortunately, the perfume modeling positions only lasted for the spring and by Memorial Day, we would be terminated. But the counter manager liked me and asked me to stay on to fill a temporary part-time job for the Charles of the Ritz makeup line, this time being employed directly by the department store.

First I was required to go to “school” for a week. Our classroom was in a beautiful and venerable old hotel in Boston. I had to learn to drive to a remote stop and take a bus into the city. The class was on the top floor and held in a glass board room overlooking the Boston Garden. Our instructor’s name was Nina, about my age, who was articulate, funny and chic, and wore the most beautiful nail color. She taught us the history and mythology of Charles of the Ritz which was a facial powder company founded in a beauty parlor at New York’s Ritz Hotel. I also learned that Charles of the Ritz owned Jean Nate, whose yellow and black bottles were seen in every Seventeen magazine I ever read as a teen.

I loved being in cosmetic school, also because lovely lunches were wheeled up to us at noon every day which included crusty french bread, soups, sandwiches and fresh iced tea. Nina exalted us with funny stories including the one when her mother had an accident and woke up banged up in a hospital bed and weakly called out for her bottle of Revenescence, which was Charles of the Ritz’s most popular facial cream of all time.

We were also given samples of the products we were schooled on, to take home to enjoy. These treasures came wrapped in pink tissue paper in small black paper bags with handles and the recognizable Charles of the Ritz script splashed across the front.

Alas, as I was told, my stint with Charles of the Ritz was not permanent and by now it was Christmastime when the department store was full of crowds bumping into each other carrying large parcels and crunching shopping bags, sometimes three at a time. But again, I was asked to stay on through the season to help out at the dedicated perfume counters.

Although the job was harder and I realized very quickly that as long as I lived, I would never use the word “gimme” to any clerk or sales person, I still enjoyed it. There was a festive camaraderie as we wrapped perfume bottles in gold paper, shoulder-to-shoulder in a little alcove created by the towering Christmas trees placed on top of the counters.

Overall, my days as a shop girl were intoxicating. To be around and have an insider’s knowledge of all the girly things I already knew and loved was thrilling. I enjoyed dressing up every day and I certainly enjoyed all the free samples I was given. Christmas in a department store, though grueling, lent another merry element to the holidays.

That winter, my husband called me back to work on our house during the day. This job was a far cry from the allure of the perfume counters. I had made enough money for us to buy paint and supplies again. But I never forgot my glamorous season as a Shop Girl.