16/08/2026
If you're a teenager looking for work or a parent of a teenager looking for work I hope this is useful from a shop owners perspective if you're looking for work.
We probably get 5 or 6 messages / emails etc every day from PARENTS of teenagers asking if there are any jobs going here for their children.
To me, an email whether it's from a parent or teen doesn't make a good impression, but this did..
Not long after we opened a young lad walked in the shop, he introduced himself, smiled and said if there were any vacancies available for work could he be considered please, and handed over a very well written CV.
I took his CV to look at later and said that currently we weren’t advertising taking any members of staff on and thank you for being so polite but there wasn’t anything available.
What he did then surprised me in that he didn’t just dash off because he’d been given a ‘no’ but stayed to chat. He complimented the shop and said he’d looked online at what we do. He was really lovely to talk to and he made a brilliant impression on me. Later I looked at his CV and showed it to my daughter and after thinking about it that evening, we decided to ask him to come back the next day for another chat. Although we weren’t thinking of taking anyone on, he’d made such a good impression that we felt we couldn’t let him go. We could only give him a few hours a week to start with but it soon became more and more days during the week that we needed him. Customers loved him and I often had messages from people saying how polite he was when he served them and it made me really glad that I changed my mind and took him on even though we weren’t looking for anyone at the time.
When looking for work (anywhere, not just here) here are some top tips from me as a shop owner, and some things to bear in mind!
Go in person to the place of business, it makes more of an impression than an email and if you’re a teenager it’s better coming from you than your parents! If a parent asks me about a job for their teen it makes me wish that the teenager had asked me themself.
Find out about the company before you go, see what they do and learn about them - this is really important!If you don’t know anything about a place why would you want to work there?
Don’t assume shop work is standing behind a till all day and that it’s easy work - refill shops are very, very different to a Tesco or similar, it’s definitely not a job where you stand behind a till all day. Working here involves heavy lifting of 20 litre containers, lots of cleaning, training and knowledge of many products and ingredients that many people haven’t heard of and aren't in a Tesco! It’s not an easy shop job and customers here sometimes ask all sorts of complicated questions 🙂
Look at a company’s social media, website and information online and decide if it’s somewhere you could see yourself being part of.
If you decide to go in - smile! Introduce yourself and speak clearly. If you've been there before that really helps. If it's a cafe you're thinking of asking, why not go for a drink and get the vibe of the place and then go and think about it.
Prepare something to say about yourself, even if you’re young you’ll have amazing experiences to share, whether it’s your favourite lesson at school, career plans, maybe you’ve done scouts or cadets or bungee jumping - talk about yourself!
Hand over a CV (controversial, some companies don’t like them but we do), say that you’re looking for work and if there is anything available could you be considered
Please don’t!...
lunge a CV at a business owner and run away without stopping to chat!
be unprepared without knowing the business
Hope that’s a little bit helpful if you have a teenager who is looking for work, we get so many requests from parents and also teens who are really unprepared and think shop work in a cute little eco shop is easy, so hopefully that’ll help!
Whenever I share this I always receive comments from parents of neuro divergent teens - I understand as a mum myself how hard it can be 😊 It's just my advice as a shop owner above, please take whatever is relevant for you and continue supporting your kids with what they need and what's right for them x
Hope this helps! With love, Amanda x
