Supporting the smooth operation of the Cathedral Museum Shop and assisting in the Undercroft Cathedral Shop, providing a warm welcome and sharing the stories behind our products.
Inspired by our saints, Cuthbert and Bede, the mission of Durham Cathedral is to offer everyone the opportunity to encounter God and know God’s love in Jesus Christ. We welcome volunteers from any background, of all faiths and none, and those who in turn show respect and sensitivity towards all nationalities, religions, beliefs, cultures, backgrounds, and the ethos of the Cathedral as a working church.
We are thrilled to be receiving a high volume of applications and enquiries about volunteering at present, although this does mean our processing times are a little longer than usual. We will do our best to reply to your enquiry via County Durham Volunteering within a week, or within two weeks of you making an application through our online application form. Thank you so much for your patience.
In this role you can expect to:
• Welcome and assist customers.
• Provide great customer service to ensure a fantastic shopping experience as part of their exit from the museum.
• Share the stories behind our product ranges.
• Monitor the museum shop space, maintaining presence and vigilance ensuring the security of stock.
• Assist with the safe and efficient flow of people when entering and exiting the museum concession area.
• Deal with visitor requests for assistance and information.
• Ensure the museum concession is stocked according to the merchandising plan and is clean and tidy.
• Use the retail app on an iPad to facilitate card payments (the concession is cashless).
• Within the Cathedral Shop with guidance from the shop manager and book buyer:
- Floor walk and look for opportunities to engage with customers to tell our stories.
- Support in maintaining retail standards – topping up and resetting displays.
• Assist with concerns from visitors efficiently and politely.
• Help to promote awareness of the visitor offer in terms of activities and events.
• Take part in training and development activities.
For this role, we are seeking volunteers who are:
• Friendly and welcoming
• Sociable and can chat with customers
• Able to work an iPad (training will be given)
• Happy to be part of a team
• Flexible and willing to do any of the shop tasks
• Keen to share the stories behind our products
• Confident in approaching and advising visitors as required
• Respectful and sensitive towards other religions, beliefs, cultures and backgrounds and the ethos of the Cathedral as a working church
• Great communicators
• Tactful and diplomatic
• Reliable with good time keeping
• Flexible and adaptable
• Willing and able to learn and use new information through instruction and relevant training courses
In this role you will usually be based in the museum concession area (part of the visitor museum exit) and the Undercroft Cathedral shop.
We encourage volunteers in the role to offer one shift per week if possible but we are grateful for any gift of time and offer flexibility around your availability.
Our main retail opening times are Monday to Saturday 10:00 - 16:00; Sunday 11:00 - 16:00.
The Museum shop space is a new enterprise launching in September 2024. In the early stages after opening, shift times may vary according to volunteer availability and could be of an 11:00 – 15:00 pattern.
Once the shop is fully established, we aspire to offer shifts that could be the entire day, or could be a morning 09:45 - 13:00 or afternoon 13:00 - 16:15 Monday to Saturday (10:45 - 16:00 on Sundays).
The following will be provided as part of your introductory training on site:
• In person training of the retail environment and the products we sell and why we sell them.
• Full training and guidance on using our iPad to facilitate card payments.
Additionally, we ask you to undertake the following essential online pre-training. These courses must be completed before you start your volunteer role. We shall send you details of how to access the training after you have applied, and support is available if you would like help with access or you feel affected by any of the course content.
• National Church of England Basic & Foundation Safeguarding training
• ACT Action Counters Terrorism training
• The Association of English Cathedrals national volunteers training
• Manual Handling training
• Playing an important role in helping to facilitate the Cathedral’s welcome and make visitors’ experience as positive as possible
• Meeting a wide range of people from all over the world
• Being part of a passionate and dedicated team
• Experience in a visitor focused retail role
• References available on request
• Opportunity to join the Cathedral’s Community Roll
• Cloister Card offering 10% discount in the Cathedral Shop and Undercroft Restaurant (conditions apply)
• Refreshments
• Various optional volunteer training as available
• Recruitment is through an application form with references, informal interview, in person training and introductory period.
• You must undertake all required safeguarding training before your start date and at all times work within the policy and procedures of the relevant safeguarding policies.
• We shall ask you to commit to the behaviours and expectations outlined in our Volunteer Agreement
