How close is too close for a personal shopper to get to their clients? 

"I have dressed former clients for their funerals because it was part of their last wishes," said a personal shopper at Neiman Marcus, who's been in this line of work for decades. After doing interviews for years for “Retail Confessions,” in which luxury retail workers talk about what selling to the world’s wealthiest fashion buyers is really like, I wanted to hear about how a veteran balances personal with professional in a line of work that’s both relationship driven and deeply personal. While this person has spent Thanksgiving with clients, they've also seen people in their position get burned by not recognizing the necessary line between friendship and work.

"Something happens, like the associate makes some kind of a faux pas…

…or says something political that's antithetical to what their client believes. Then not only have they lost a friend, they've also lost a client," this person said.

Then there are people who get too close, only to then be "treated like they're the help." 

For example: the salesperson whose kid needed an emergency procedure and got some help from a well-connected client, only to get calls at 7 a.m. from their driver demanding the salesperson drive 90 minutes to the client’s home to help her fit clothes that that salesperson didn’t even sell her. "It's very, if you give a mouse a cookie, how far is somebody going to push it?" the source said.

In the full interview, some revealing answers to that question, a billionaire horror story, a prediction about the future of the Birkin, and more. 

Who are your customers?

Mainly professional C-suite women. I've got multiple CEOs, partners at consulting firms, CFOs, CMOs — women who are incredibly successful in industries that are still male-dominated. 

I used to have a couple of the, "My husband is a billionaire,” or, “My husband's incredibly successful and this is what I do for fun, I just need to get out of the house" kind of people. But they would drive me crazy because some of them would say, “I need to ask my husband about basically everything." And the success rate for that is not incredibly high.

If you had to put a figure on it, what was the success rate?

Probably 40 percent.

What did the husbands like?

Typically stuff that was inherently much more feminine. Floral blouses and jeans. If they're going to a charity thing, a V-neck, but not too much cleavage, fitted but not too fitted.

I'm never one who’s like, "I'm going to make my clients look sexy." I had a couple appointments where the husband would come in with the wife and be like, "Yeah, but I want to see more cleavage." And I'd just be sitting there like, "What the fuck am I supposed to do in this moment?"

The guys who came in with girlfriends, was it a sugar daddy situation?

I had one who was a professional escort.