Egghead Workers Step Into Yoke And Harness New Employees Of Local Service Center Are Taking Crash Software Course For Jan. 23 Opening

Less than a week before opening Egghead Software’s customer service center in Liberty Lake, the first 90 employees are taking a crash course on the world’s leading computer programs.

Poised before giant training screens - and some of the pros they expect to replace - workers are racing to absorb everything they can in time for a Jan. 23 opening, said Elmer Baldwin, vice president of corporate, government and education sales.

“I couldn’t be happier with the quality of people we’ve got,” Baldwin said in a recent telephone interview. “They’ll have to be very familiar with many, many products.”

The Issaquah, Wash.-based company last month announced plans to consolidate 10 sales centers around the country into the Liberty Lake plant. Egghead is the nation’s largest reseller of computer software.

Initially the facility - called the Egghead Solutions Center - will employ 130 people, but could swiftly grow beyond that. About 2,000 people applied to work at the national center.

Employees will answer questions and makes sales to business, government and school customers throughout North America.

This group had contributed more than half of Egghead’s $194.3 million in sales for the second fiscal quarter ended Oct. 1, 1994. The rest of the sales came from Egghead’s 179 retail stores and a mail-order catalog.

Egghead’s decision to consolidate into Spokane was hailed by securities analysts as a brilliant cost-saving move that will position the company for future growth and profit. But it’s a challenging step for the Egghead and its freshmen employees.

Construction crews worked through the holidays to retrofit a former Hewlett-Packard Inc. building in time for the opening. Banks of telephones, computers and desks were installed in a large central room where most of the calls will come in.

Egghead also brought in experts from the centers it plans to close to train their replacements on everything from Windows to the Internet.

Employees must be versed in a dozen leading software products developed by Microsoft, Lotus and others. They also must be familiar with thousands of other products offered in Egghead catalogs and know how to help customers install their new software and operate it.

“We get thousands of calls daily,” Baldwin said. “It doesn’t do any good to just sell software in the box. Our customers are looking for solutions.”

Egghead barred media access to the Solutions Center prior to opening, but have scheduled an open house in February.

To ensure a smooth transition for the consolidation, Egghead will keep its other centers open past Jan. 23 “until the telephone stops ringing,” Baldwin said. By May, he said, Spokane employees will learn to make outbound sales calls to regular customers.

That could boost Egghead’s sales and profitability at a time when the company is attempting to rebound from four years of management turnover and a recent string of losses.

Egghead reported a loss of $981,000 - its third-consecutive quarter of losses - during the second quarter. But sales jumped 17 percent and analyst expect a more positive report on Feb. 2 when third-quarter earnings are disclosed.

“We’re doing our best to turn corner, but it’s a marathon,” Baldwin said. “We’ve got a long way to go.”