'I want to speak to sales, not admin!' - female representation in automotive

[Franco Cozzo]

Come across this news article today which is about female sales crews at automotive retailers/industry and how male customers are refusing to deal with them - demanding to speak to one of the lads:

Female Autobarn airs frustration at male customers asking to speak to ‘one of the boys’

A female Autobarn employee has voiced her frustration at customers assuming she can’t help with their car problems.

A female Autobarn employee has voiced her frustration at customers assuming she can’t help with their car problems, gaining a bucketful of traction in a Tik Tok video shared last week.

Jansu, who is an auto enthusiast with thousands of followers across her social media channels, posted clips of her responding to calls from customers asking for car parts.

In one clip, she takes a call from a “prospective customer” who does not believe she can answer his question about needing “something” for his vehicle.

https://www.news.com.au/technology/o...cabb5b11c9628?

In the last 5 years there has been a huge increase in female representation in automotive parts, it used to be pretty rare to hear a female voice over the phone but these days it's real common, I've got no dramas with that.

I've got my very first female colleague in my crew at work who I manage and she cops a lot of **** from customers not wanting to talk to her even though she's more than capable of answering their questions. I end up getting tied up having conversations for basic requirements that they don't really need me to handle for them, which I don't really mind but from a business perspective it's not ideal.

We've got a couple women in our sales crew nationally, Brisbane, Perth and Melbourne all have female representation, with Brisbane being majority female.

Out of curiosity I reached out to them and their managers today about this and it doesn't matter where you are, story seems the same as our experience here in Melbourne, our customers don't want to deal with female staff members or just second guess everything they say, they'll demand to speak to one of the lads, who'll tell them the same thing that they suddenly believe.

Given we're a male dominated field and also hobby as car enthusiasts, are you comfortable dealing with female staff when you're chasing parts and service, or do you prefer speaking to and or seeing men at these businesses?

Could be an interesting discussion.