In the passage from the article, “Going for the Look…,” by Steven Greenhouse, Marshal Cohen, a market analyst, brings up the idea that companies should hire people who are attractive, attractive to what they think is attractive or what they think their customers will think is attractive. They do this so their store is enticing to their community, which allows them to be successful in the current retail market. Cohen insists that “It’s really important to create an environment that’s enticing to the community, particularly with the younger, fashionable market.” He then furthers this argument by saying, “A guy wants to go hang out in a store where he can see good looking gals.” What he is saying here is that stores in retail and even other …show more content…
Roppolo, a lawyer, says “I tell employers that their main focus needs to be hiring someone who can get the job done. When they want to hire to project a certain image that’s where things can get screwy.” What he is saying is that hiring people because of their looks, to project an image for your business, may not be directly illegal, but it is risky and can lead to inadvertent discrimination. He also says that he recommends just to hire ‘someone who can get the job done.’ Thus allowing for the most efficient business possible with a reduced chance of getting into legal trouble. Antonio Serrano, a former assistant store manager for Abercrombie & Fitch says, “If someone came in with a pretty face, we were told to approach them and ask them if they wanted a job. . . They thought if we had the best-looking college kids working in our store, everyone will want to shop there.” What Mr. Serrano is implying is that if someone came into their store who had their look, that would be good enough to get a job. Even if they had no experience, the employees were told to say “Who cares? We’ll hire you anyways” Serrano says. Basically, they were told to hire the most attractive people in the attempt to get as much business as possible for their store, thus allowing their store to make more money. Employee …show more content…
Elysa Yanowitz tells about when she was a West Coast sales manager for L’Oreal. She says, she felt “intense pressure to hire attractive saleswomen, even if they were incompetent . . .” suggesting that even if they had no experience or couldn’t be of any use in demonstrating or selling the product, they should be hired. The article goes on to say that “company officials sought to force her [Yanowitz] out after she ignored an order to fire a woman a top manager described as not “hot” enough for the company image. She then suggests, “It was pretty well understood that the store employees had to have a magazine-look quality. Everyone was supposed to look like a 110 pound model.” Further, the article points out that L’Oreal officials did not comment on this assertion. In her statement, Ms.Yanowitz provides support for the idea that a qualified worker, who had demonstrated the ability to do her job well, to the point where she went above and beyond for customer service, had to be fired because she wasn’t attractive enough, at least in someone’s eyes. This probably led to L’Oreal hiring a person who had that “magazine-look quality” but was incapable of doing their job effectively. Donna Harper, a supervisory attorney, said the following, “The problem with all this image stuff is it just reeks of marketing for