Job Check
Retail Salespersons
Sell merchandise, such as furniture, motor vehicles, appliances, or apparel to consumers.
10 main tasks · most important first
Your main tasks and AI
Importance- 01Greet customers and ascertain what each customer wants or needs.Mostly human for now
- 02Recommend, select, and help locate or obtain merchandise based on customer needs and desires.People already use AI for this at work
- 03Compute sales prices, total purchases, and receive and process cash or credit payment.AI could speed this up, with extra tools
- 04Prepare merchandise for purchase or rental.Mostly human for now
- 05Answer questions regarding the store and its merchandise.People already use AI for this at work
- 06Maintain knowledge of current sales and promotions, policies regarding payment and exchanges, and security practices.AI could speed this up, with extra tools
- 07Demonstrate use or operation of merchandise.Mostly human for now
- 08Describe merchandise and explain use, operation, and care of merchandise to customers.People already use AI for this at work
- 09Ticket, arrange, and display merchandise to promote sales.People already use AI for this at work
- 10Inventory stock and requisition new stock.AI could speed this up, with extra tools
Tasks from O*NET® 31.0 (US Department of Labor, CC BY 4.0, changed by us), most important first. “Already use” comes from Anthropic’s data on real work chats with Claude; “could speed up” from task ratings made with GPT-4 in 2023.
Four studies, side by side
None is a forecast of job loss32%of this job’s work time goes to tasks that people already do with Claude at work, counting tasks where AI only helps as half (2026).Anthropic, 2026
34%of this job’s tasks an AI model could do in half the time, counting tasks that need extra tools as half (rated in 2023).Eloundou, Manning, Mishkin and Rock, 2023
Above 89% of jobsin how often and how well AI helped with this job’s work in Microsoft Copilot chats (2024 data).Microsoft Research (Tomlinson et al.), 2025
Above 73% of jobsin how much of this job’s physical work robots have been shown to do, from factories to homes (2026).Anthropic, 2026
Your human edge
The main tasks with no real AI use seen and no big speed-up expected. This is where your skill counts most today.
- Greet customers and ascertain what each customer wants or needs.
- Prepare merchandise for purchase or rental.
- Demonstrate use or operation of merchandise.
AI tools for your work
Official connectors that let an AI assistant work inside the apps sales use. Each is made by the app’s own maker.