Study: The top reasons that retail employees decide to quit — or stay — are…

Education benefits are important to today’s retail employees.

Poor or no education benefits (61%) and physically exhausting/stressful conditions (59%) top the list of reasons why employees decide to leave their jobs, according to a study of retail employees conducted in fall 2022 by Lotis Blue Consulting (formerly Axiom Consulting Partners), which evaluated what influences retail employees’ decision to stay, consider leaving or leave an employer. Other top reasons employees quit are dislike of manager, schedule isn’t flexible, not recognized for efforts (all at 57%) and unfair pay practices (54%).

Staying: As to why employees are staying on the job, the top driver was “like working with co-workers” (70%), followed by “job is enjoyable” (68%), diversity and job stability (both at 67%) and ability to take time off (59%).

Other reasons for staying on the job included satisfactory pay (57%) and flexible schedule (55%).

Considering Leaving: A job that is too physically exhausting/stressful (58%) and low pay (56%) are the top reasons employees are considering leaving their job, along with limited or no advancement opportunities, no opportunities for raises/bonuses and poor or no education benefit.

Key insights from the Lotis report are below:

• Looking across categories and the drivers of Stay/Leave decisions, we find that social connections (e.g., “liking co-workers”), an enjoyable and stable job that is not too physically exhausting, and a safe work environment are essential to retaining retail talent.

• Non-unionized retail employees are split on whether they would consider joining a union, but the majority of those who are in a union are satisfied, mostly driven by their perceptions of increased pay.

• Education benefits are increasingly more important turnover drivers for the more transitory segment of the retail workforce, however, these benefits aren’t key retention drivers in the Staying segment.

• While satisfaction with pay level significantly increased as a retention driver, employers should be watchful that perceptions about fairness of pay practices (up 15% from the April study) and promotions (up 9%) are increasing in strength as drivers of turnover and intention to leave.

• Pay satisfaction increased by nearly 20 percentage points [from April] suggesting that the wage wars of spring and summer 2022 had a strong impact on decisions to stay with a current employer.

Research for the Lotis Blue Future of Workforce Study was conducted in fall 2022 and surveyed more than 1,000 employees at 300 retailers across the apparel, big box, grocery, fast casual dining, specialty, convenience store, home goods, luxury apparel and electronics sectors.