The Company That Sells Love to America Had a Dark Secret For thousands of women, working at the nat
The Company That Sells Love to America Had a Dark Secret
For thousands of women, working at the nations largest jewelry retailer meant unequal pay, harassment or worse.
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The pay-and-promotions lawsuit against Sterling Jewelers Inc. began the way a lot of these things begin: In 2005, Dawn Souto-Coons walked out of the jewelry store where she had been a successful assistant manager and into a local Tampa-area employment office, claiming sex discrimination in her store. She had been working at a Jared the Galleria of Jewelry for nearly four years. But it was only in the last few months that she began to understand that the thing that kept happening to her there, the thing that seemed to keep happening to so many of the women there, went beyond the regular, standard-issue sexism she had been hearing about her whole life. But what woman is certain that the problem isnt her, but them?
She had been with Sterling for nearly 14 years by then. Previously, she was a manager at another Sterling store, a J.B. Robinson, when her husband relocated to Florida for work. She asked the company for a transfer, too, and was offered an assistant-manager position at a Jared that hadnt yet opened. Jared was a relatively new concept, Sterlings first stand-alone, nonmall store with high-end everything, a drink when you walked through the door, a sandwich, too, Rolexes that you couldnt find in any of the mall jewelry shops. Dawn loved jewelry. She loved being a character in her customers stories about a happy day of their lives. She was excited about the even higher-end jewelry that Jared would sell. The idea of working with the really good stuff made the demotion palatable. She told me she took the job on the condition that she would be in the running for the first manager post that opened up.
But she wasnt. Not when the manager left for training to be a district manager; not when that man was replaced by a man who had just two years of experience at another jewelry store along with a few years of nonjewelry experience at a Mens Wearhouse. She reminded her district manager that over the course of her tenure, she had helped take the J.B. Robinson from around $800,000 in sales to more than $3 million, but she wasnt even given an interview. Instead, she was made acting manager while her district manager looked for someone new. The manager he hired made dirty jokes about the bodies of female customers who walked in and shopped. But at the same time, her district manager brought in a manager in waiting, a man who would train under Dawn at a managers salary so that he could be fast-tracked to management. The manager in waiting told a female sales associate that he wanted to lick her head to toe, Dawn told me. He also would sometimes ask a saleswoman if she would meet him and a few others at the Bennigans nearby, but when the woman got there, shed find that she was the only one hed asked. He was soon promoted to another store, and yet another man was made store manager. It wasnt that Dawn felt entitled to the manager position. She simply wanted to be allowed to interview for it. She never was.
She found out about the pay issue by accident. She had helped recruit Marie Wolf, a woman who had sold a million dollars worth of jewelry in one year at the Service Merchandise down the road. According to Dawn, her manager didnt seem to like Marie, despite the fact that Dawn said she was the top salesperson not just at Service Merchandise but now at Jared as well. She didnt have the Jared look, the manager told Dawn. Marie was tall and wore pants and blouses, not short skirt-suits, and she wore little makeup. One day Marie asked for a raise, and the manager told her she was already making more than any other salesperson in the store. Dawn knew better. While she was acting manager, she had access to payroll forms and had seen some discrepancies: in particular, that a male sales associate who was recently recruited from a tile store was making $2 an hour more than Marie. The egregiousness of the managers lie bothered Dawn. That night, after the manager went home, she closed the door to the administrative office and took out all the payroll records and spread them out over the desks. One by one she saw it: There were seven women and five men who were counted as full-time sales associates. In only one case was a woman making more than a man, and it was only when you compared the highest-paid woman with the lowest-paid man. The womens hourly wages averaged $10.39, and the mens averaged $13.40 so that on average, a woman working a 30-hour workweek for 52 weeks each year would make $16,208.40 before bonuses, while a man working the same amount would make $20,904. The men did not have more experience, nor were they quantifiably better salespeople.
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Dawn Souto-Coons, a former assistant manager at a Jared the Galleria of Jewelry in greater Tampa, who helped initiate the class-action suit against Sterling Jewelers Inc.CreditElinor Carucci for The New York Times
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https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/23/magazine/kay-jewelry-sexual-harassment.html?action=click&module=Top%20Stories&pgtype=Homepage
TygrBright
(20,759 posts)Wounded Bear
(58,649 posts)The Corporate world has no scruples unless forced on them by law and enforcement.
oldsoftie
(12,533 posts)on the American public. And continuing for about 80 years or so. Diamonds are neither rare nor valuable. But the DeBeers company did a GREAT job of getting US women to believe that they HAD to have one to be engaged; and getting US men to believe that they HAD to spend a certain amount for their love to be considered REAL.
Raster
(20,998 posts)...huge international Gem and Jewelry show that took place in Tucson. I was invited by management as a guest one year and given a full-access media pass. One of the things that I still remember was the DeBeers "booth," which was centrally located in the biggest, best ballroom and staffed by impeccably tall, good-looking South Afrikaners, women in couture evening gowns, the men in fitted tuxedos. Blond, blond and blonder. They took their image extremely seriously.
oldsoftie
(12,533 posts)dalton99a
(81,485 posts)The whole diamond business is a scam.
oldsoftie
(12,533 posts)Not a slam on women, they're the target of the marketing for 100 years. And Marketing is an amazing thing.
Just like on the male side, look at how trucks are advertised. ALWAYS with a rugged looking tough guy, off road, towing something huge or carrying a massive load of boulders, etc. And guys fall all over themselves to get one for 50000. And it never leaves the road.
dalton99a
(81,485 posts)oldsoftie
(12,533 posts)cstanleytech
(26,291 posts)niyad
(113,293 posts)lostnfound
(16,178 posts)Horrifying.
Blue_Tires
(55,445 posts)3Hotdogs
(12,375 posts)Karadeniz
(22,513 posts)exact numbers at hand,but she did and they were impressive.) Gloria worked out how much more purchasing dollars would be out in the economy if women made as much as men. She had the figure. Very good for the economy!
SharonAnn
(13,772 posts)That was over my entire 40 year career. And I was in the computer field with "good pay for women". And there wasn't any other company paying noticeably more to women.
Combination of being paid less for the same job as men and very slow promotion rate though I was usually the best performer in the group.
Now that I'm retired, I realize just how badly I was cheated. That money would've made a huge difference in 401-K investments, savings, and monthly retirement pay. Cheated over and over again.
The only thing that makes it bearable is that I know it wasn't me, it was the system. You couldn't just leave a job and get another that paid equal to men. All employers in my field did this. And remember, it was a computer scientist, systems engineer, IT manager career.
Karadeniz
(22,513 posts)NYMinute
(3,256 posts)Better late than never.