It’s natural for retail managers to focus on their best- and poorest-performing salespeople, writes Adam Hankinson, CEO at sales training specialist, Furniture Sales Solutions – but there are huge potential gains to be made by encouraging the majority in the middle …
Every sales team, whether in furniture retail or beyond, has three groups. At the top, the stars who consistently overachieve. At the bottom, the strugglers who absorb most of the manager’s time and attention. And in the middle, the backbone – the steady, reliable group who hit targets some months and miss them in others.
It’s natural for leaders to focus on the top and bottom. High performers are celebrated, often with minimal input. Underperformers attract scrutiny, consuming much of a manager’s time. But the true key to sustainable sales growth lies elsewhere – moving the middle.
Why the middle matters
The middle group is where the numbers stack up. In most retailers, the majority of the sales team sit here. They’re competent, capable, and carrying a large share of turnover. If you can shift this group upwards by just a notch, the impact dwarfs what’s possible by focusing only on the top or bottom.
Take a typical team of 10 salespeople. Two are high flyers, two struggle, and six form the middle ground. If those six could each win just one extra order per week, and if that order averages £1,500, then across the group that’s £9,000 of extra sales weekly. Multiply that by 47 working weeks in the year, and you’re looking at well over £400,000 in additional revenue – without hiring a single extra person.
The coaching gap
Why does the middle get overlooked? Because they’re not causing problems. Managers feel compelled to ‘fix’ the bottom, while the middle quietly ticks along. But left alone, they plateau. The difference between ‘solid’ and ‘exceptional’ is rarely talent – it’s coaching, encouragement, and structured development.
This is where our Seven Habits of the Most Successful Furnishings Salespeople comes in. Attitude, approach, questioning, listening, selling solutions, concluding confidently, and generating referrals – these aren’t elite skills reserved for the top 5%. They’re disciplines anyone in the middle can master with the right guidance.
Practical steps to move the middle
Shift the spotlight: Celebrate incremental wins. Recognise the salesperson who improved their finance attach rate, not just the one who wrote the biggest order.
Coach on the elbow: Middle performers thrive on feedback in the moment. Catching them ‘doing it right’ builds confidence and cements habits.
Break it down: Small, measurable goals work best. One extra order per week is achievable, meaningful, and transformational when multiplied across the team.
Build belief: Middle performers often don’t see themselves as ‘top’. Coaching should reinforce that the gap is smaller than they think, and entirely within reach.
The payoff
When you move the middle, everyone feels the lift. Sales grow, morale rises, and the business gains resilience. Top performers are inspired by the competitive push, while bottom performers see clearer models of success to emulate.
The real opportunity lies in coaching the core – the people who make up the majority of your team, and the majority of your results. Moving the middle is where it’s at. And in today’s competitive retail environment, it’s essential.
