In recent years, business has been tough, a common consensus. Thus, we see many articles online discussing corporate strategic dilemmas and distributor development challenges, guiding companies and distributors on how to thrive against the trend in a downward economy, how to improve store coverage, how to manage sales, and how to ensure rapid business growth... Have you noticed? We focus on industry changes, corporate development, and distributor difficulties, yet rarely pay attention to the situation of frontline salespeople who also face intense market competition and sales issues. In the current macroeconomic downturn, how do frontline salespeople execute their sales tasks? What are their thoughts on their work? How do they feel about the industry? Last week, I followed several salespeople in third- and fourth-tier cities for three days, visiting a total of 78 terminal stores. This article records interactions with frontline FMCG salespeople and the most authentic market experiences to present the real situation and feelings of the salesperson group at this stage. I hope to convey this frontline voice to more industry operators, managers, and practitioners. I also believe this frontline perspective can bring different insights and inspiration to sales managers, whether distributors or brand owners.
Would rather deliver food than be a salesperson? FMCG companies find it hard to recruit and retain people. It's so difficult that there's a saying online: "I'd rather deliver food than be a salesperson." In this regard, salesperson Sister Ji said that not only delivery workers and couriers, but all grassroots workers have limited choices in their careers. Sister Ji is 48 years old and has been in the FMCG industry for nearly two years. She has two sons and faces financial pressure after being laid off in middle age. Before becoming an FMCG salesperson, she delivered food and worked in courier services. In her words, "At this age, without connections or skills, it's good to find any job! Salespeople have relatively higher salaries and decent benefits. Although there's sales pressure, at least the work is more flexible, and I have time to take care of my family." In fact, whether it's a short-term transition or a long-term plan, when a person starts thinking about whether to deliver food or become a salesperson, it shows that their available resources, connections, and social concepts have greatly limited their choices. For example, if many people around you are delivering food, you might also choose to deliver food; if your surroundings are full of salespeople, you're likely to become a salesperson. There's no good or bad choice; every era and industry has a group of ordinary people walking.
Many describe salespeople as the lowest-level, no-barrier profession. But Sister Wang, a salesperson with 10 years of FMCG experience, disagrees. "Many think a salesperson's job is simple, just delivering goods from one store to another. That's a prejudice. The actual work is far more than that; it's full of randomness every day. It's easy to enter, but hard to excel."
Easy to enter, hard to excel A day in the life of a frontline salesperson: Arrive at the company before 7:30 AM, attend the morning meeting, plan the day's work and route; load the vehicle by 9 AM, then start planned visits along the route; upon arriving at a store, greet the owner; observe in-store display, inventory, and competitor status, take photos and upload for terminal information collection; open boxes, stock shelves, and tidy the display; communicate policies with the store owner and suggest orders; confirm orders, fill out customer cards and order forms; leave the store and schedule the next visit. Repeat these visits until completing the planned visit targets.
The above are the most basic actions; doing them is just passing, but to do well requires more effort. For example, at key moments, Sister Wang brings her own posters, digs out product selling points, and creates vivid displays at terminal outlets, such as writing "fresh milk" on short-shelf-life pure milk and "39% more protein" on concentrated milk. Sister Ji meticulously records daily visit routes, each outlet's intake volume, product dates, and areas for improvement, and timely coordinates between stores. These frontline salespeople's subjective attention to detail is usually driven by customer relationships and performance. But in actual work, various emergencies can occur, making emotional intelligence and adaptability extremely important.
During a visit with Sister Wang, I encountered a conflict with another salesperson over terminal shelf space: there was an empty spot on a low-temperature display cabinet from a certain company, and we placed our products there without knowing. When that company's salesperson discovered it, they reported it in a group chat. In a stock market competition, grabbing shelf resources is crucial. I thought a conflict would erupt, but actually, after clarifying the misunderstanding, both sides softened their attitudes. As for the reason, Sister Wang said, "In frontline work, shelf wars are common, and colleagues often deliberately hide competitors' products. If you find out early, it's fine; if late, you have to suffer in silence. A salesperson's job revolves around people. You not only need to build good relationships with store owners but also maintain relationships with peers to avoid vicious competition."
Companies want growth, but the market reacts slowly Besides handling complex relationships, the biggest source of pressure for FMCG salespeople is sales volume. Companies always want growth, but performance cannot grow forever.
According to Sister Wang, the sales target for a brand is based on previous years' sales. For example, the 2023 annual sales target was set in the second half of 2022. But market conditions vary each year. In previous years, due to the pandemic, consumers had a habit of stockpiling, so terminal sell-through was fast. However, since March this year, Sister Wang noticed many supermarkets in her area closing or transferring, and the surviving stores' sell-through has declined significantly. Sister Ji directly said, "This year, the market is tough. Manufacturers want sales, but terminals just aren't moving products. Besides consumers' reduced spending power after the pandemic, the market is too chaotic now." Sister Ji's territory has many community stores, and this year, many convenience stores and snack shops have appeared near communities, affecting store sales, making life hard for salespeople. Handling large-date products alone has overwhelmed many.
"Channel crossing has always existed in the industry, but this year it's especially prevalent." According to Sister Ji, one of the company's products is local milk A, which is well-received at terminals due to local support, and sold quickly in previous years. However, the brand also has milk B, which has many agents and fierce competition. In recent years, with poor market conditions, manufacturers have shifted pressure to distributors and agents, setting heavy tasks, leading to severe channel crossing. "Many agents, to boost sales and get rebates, don't care about other territories' prices; they only care about their own."
On the second day of research, when Sister Ji and I went to unload goods at a wholesale store, the owner tried to negotiate the price of Sister Ji's milk based on the crossed price of milk B. For store owners, they don't care about channel crossing; they prioritize low prices for the same category. The owner revealed that he could pull goods from another region for 26 yuan per box (normal purchase price is 31 yuan) and sell them at 29.9, which is even lower than the purchase price of milk A. Later, when Sister Ji tried to contact terminals with good relationships and fast sell-through to handle large-date milk A, she encountered low-priced crossed milk B, making large-date milk A uncompetitive next to it, so she had to give up.
Can't compete, can't lie flat No word better describes the current situation of FMCG salespeople than "conflicted."
Sister Wang told me, "Last month coincided with the Mid-Autumn Festival, so sell-through was fast, and many families still have milk at home, so this month's sell-through is lagging. Now many salespeople in the company are ready to 'lie flat' (give up), but they actually can't." When asked why, Sister Wang said, "Living costs are rising. If we lie flat, what about mortgage payments? Car loans? Baby formula money? It's hard to find a job now. If performance keeps declining, the first to be 'optimized' by the company will be those who lie flat."
Old Li, a salesperson with 8 years of FMCG experience, said, "The current work state is intermittent. We push hard in peak seasons, and in off-seasons, it's good if we don't lose money. After so many years in FMCG, changing industries is impossible; switching jobs is just from one company to another, with no essential difference." When salespeople find that "hustling" can no longer save performance, they can only shout "lie flat" for some psychological comfort. But truly lying flat is still a minority; the reality is that with rising living costs, most salespeople can neither hustle nor lie flat.
FMCG salespeople trapped in the system Besides performance and survival pressure, another discomfort for salespeople is "system pressure." Sister Wang revealed that since the company introduced a system, she feels trapped in it.
"The actual work of a salesperson is full of randomness every day. With the system, I feel constrained. For example, if a customer outside the planned route asks for delivery, you have to go; if a store places other items on the displayed products, to meet photo requirements, you temporarily remove them, take a photo, and put them back, which doesn't reflect the real terminal display." Sister Ji said that for rural people who switched from farming to sales, learning to use the system takes time, and each system has different functions; the more systems the company introduces, the greater the pressure.
During the three-day research, I witnessed countless times when salespeople had to return to visited stores because they missed taking photos, or received calls from managers to retake photos because they didn't meet standards. Initially, Sister Wang, born in the 90s, supported the company's decision to introduce the system. But as the feeling of being constrained by the system grew, she began to resist. "The company initially introduced the system to help salespeople improve efficiency and standardize terminal actions, but somehow it became a tool to monitor salespeople! Now it feels like you don't need professional skills or sales ability, but you must know how to take and upload photos."
An increasingly unfamiliar industry The disappearing salesperson At the end of the three-day investigation, Sister Wang admitted that after ten years in the industry, she feels increasingly unfamiliar with the current FMCG market. Not only Sister Wang, but this unfamiliarity makes many "old salespeople" feel powerless. Besides new business formats and new ways of playing in the industry, salespeople can also feel their value at the terminal gradually weakening. This feeling is correct. In the past, terminal salespeople and promoters had strong influence over consumers' final purchase decisions, but in recent years, as consumption concepts become more rational, terminal recommendations are giving way to consumers' free choice. At the same time, the importance of the relationship between salespeople and stores in promoting supply-demand cooperation is also further diminishing.
It is understood that Sister Wang's company is transforming into a digital distributor. Sister Wang said that she used to be confident about the future development of salespeople, but now she feels confused. When channels mature and achieve online-offline integration, companies will reduce their dependence on salespeople, and then traditional salespeople may seem to have no value.
But even so, it is certain that frontline workers will not disappear in the future; their functions will change. How to possess the competitiveness needed to keep up with the times before the era eliminates them is a question every frontline salesperson should consider.
Final thoughts The frontline seems far away, so far that most of the time we can "tacitly" ignore the subjectivity of a group, even dehumanize them as "human components" serving systems and machines. These frontline salespeople's stories may be insignificant compared to industry trends and strategies in the eyes of many brand executives and distributor bosses. But I want to say, frontline salespeople are really not easy! In the development of the entire industry, they are indispensable yet always marginalized. Will salespeople disappear in the future? No, but their functions will definitely evolve. With the gradual penetration of digitalization, sales will combine with technology. In the past, salespeople's work revolved around terminals, or completing what terminals needed; the terminal was the endpoint. With the advent of the internet era, the industry landscape has changed, and traditional channels and the internet are merging without boundaries; in the future, the terminal may become the starting point. On the frontline, facing an increasingly "un-hustleable" market, there are many excellent FMCG salespeople like Sister Wang and Sister Ji who keep "struggling." They may not understand trends, but by perceiving market changes and customer needs, they have begun to possess basic marketing capabilities. As they continue to learn and progress toward more professional paths, I hope companies will give them more confidence and support. Where there are people, there are channels; where there are channels, there must be frontline marketing people!