Years “very trying”. These words come immediately to Amel Medjahed, 22, when she is asked to describe her journey in ready-to-wear sales. “We don’t imagine it straight awayraises the Parisian, who started as a saleswoman at 15 years old during her professional commerce baccalaureate, but saleswoman means handling all day. » Carry packages of clothing weighing several kilos, unpack, place on shelves – sometimes several meters high –, pick up, fold, collect… All while remaining constantly standing.
Having passed through various brands, from lingerie to high-end stores, Amel then comes home in the evening with significant leg pain, caused by repeated trampling. Before the age of 20, she developed pain in her arms, shoulders and ribs which persisted for a long time. In the shopping malls where she worked, the absence of windows and therefore natural light disrupted her biological rhythm and gradually caused her eyesight to decline.
In his entourage, however, some tend to “minimize” the fatigue generated by this very feminized profession (88% of ready-to-wear salespeople are saleswomen), reports Amel. “People will say that it’s an easy job, even a little stupid, but you have to see what it’s like to carry packages that are four times your weight for hours! »exclaims the young woman who, exhausted, recently left the ready-to-wear sector for optics.
Like sales, hairdressing, aesthetics and hospitality are all very feminine sectors where workers, often young, are exposed to numerous physical risks. And this in complete invisibility. When she co-directed a study on apprentices in the automotive and hairdressing tradesthe sociologist Fanny Renard nevertheless noted that, in hairdressing, “the arduousness proves to be as great as in car garages: many musculoskeletal disorders, due to arm postures and repeated gestures, or even daily confrontation with toxic products”.
Unstable conditions
From her beginnings in hairdressing, Tifanny (who does not give her last name), now 31 years old, suffered from repeated tendinitis. In the low-cost salon in the North where she started in CAP then in BTS, shampoos, cuts and blow-drys are done ” the chain “, elbows constantly in the air carrying hairdryers and scissors. Without always having time to position yourself well or to recover, with “lots of overtime”.
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