ryan.basen@roanoke.com 981-3340

On her way back from a recent family vacation to West Virginia, 19-year-old Rachel Wheeler called her manager at the Carmike 10 Cinemas at Tanglewood Mall to see when she was next scheduled to work.

To her surprise, an assistant manager at the theater told Wheeler she had been fired.

Her transgression? She had failed to "upsell" concession items such as popcorn or soda to a customer, who turned out instead to be a "checker" for the theater company. The checker informed Carmike management, and Carmike 10 manager Richard Kobert was ordered to terminate Wheeler, she said.

Upselling is the practice of encouraging customers to order larger, more expensive sizes of food, drink or other products.

Wheeler, a Southwest Roanoke County resident, was not the first employee at Carmike 10 to lose a job because of a failure to upsell. She wasn't even the first in her family. Her brother, Jonathan Wheeler, 18, was fired in May for the same reason.

Two other employees that the Wheelers know of have also recently been fired for failing to upsell: Patrick Knicely, 19, and another teenager, both Southwest County residents.

Their terminations, they said, are because of a new policy being enforced by Columbus, Ga.-based Carmike Cinemas.

The firings are a blunt lesson in sales and profits for the teens. They also underscore the importance of concessions to movie theater companies such as Carmike, which is righting itself after emerging from Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection two years ago.

The Wheelers and Knicely each began working at Carmike 10 in 2002. They underwent training, in which they were told to upsell and watched a video demonstrating the proper way to upsell, before starting their jobs.

They also signed an employee contract, and one of the provisions in the contract stated they should upsell to every customer. All three remember signing the contract.

According to Knicely and the Wheelers, Carmike management often sends ordinary people to Carmike 10 as checkers who pose as customers and report to management about employee behavior and the conditions at the theater.

Carmike, in its 2003 annual report, acknowledges the practice and has incentives in place to reward theater managers who help increase certain revenues:

"We have an incentive bonus program for theatre level management, which provides for bonuses based on incremental improvements in theatre profitability, including concession sales. As part of this program, we evaluate 'mystery shopper' reports."

Mystery shopping is gaining popularity in retail industries, according to the Dallas-based Mystery Shopping Providers Association. Executive Director John Swinburn said mystery shopping has been going on for at least 60 years and "is used in virtually every industry that deals directly with consumers."

At the Roanoke Carmike, the fired workers said, management initially used checkers to reward employees who did their jobs well. About a year ago, though, Carmike 10 employees were informed at a meeting that they could also be fired if they were caught failing to upsell a checker, the former workers said.

Kobert declined to comment for this article, except to confirm that the meeting took place and that the four teenagers were fired for failing to upsell. He also said, "I don't want to see them fired."

Ken Lehman, Northeastern Division manager for Carmike Cinemas (who oversees Virginia Carmike cinemas), also declined to comment, on the grounds that Carmike would not address any of its policies.

Knicely and the Wheelers said that upselling to every customer is difficult. To say that all Carmike 10 employees upsell all the time, as they are supposed to, is "pretty bold," Knicely said.

"If you work a double concession," Jonathan Wheeler said, "most likely you will forget" at least once.

Neither the Wheelers nor Knicely can recall the specific time they may have been caught failing to upsell by a checker, but all three confirmed that they did forget at times.

When they were fired, they were upset, but understood why they had been let go.

"Upselling was always something you were supposed to do," Knicely said.

The fired workers said they had not been individually warned previously about failing to upsell concessions.

Carmike is one of three major movie theater companies with cinemas in Southwest Virginia. The other two are Charlotte, N.C.-based Consolidated Theaters and Knoxville, Tenn.-based Regal Entertainment Group.

Marie McClaflin, director of marketing for Consolidated Theatres, which owns the Valley View Grande in Roanoke, said Consolidated employees are trained to upsell. Checkers are also sent to watch them, but to reward instead of discipline workers.

McClaflin said if a Consolidated employee smiles at and wishes a checker to "enjoy the movie," that employee and other employees working at that time get gift certificates.

McClaflin said upselling is encouraged but not mandatory.

"Upselling is just another tool to help increase the bottom line," she said. Firing employees who fail to upsell is "just not an acceptable way to keep the staff motivated. We absolutely wouldn't consider it."

Kathy Chittum, executive director of the Grandin Theatre in Roanoke, said Grandin employees are not asked to upsell.

"I don't think people appreciate that," Chittum said. "If our customers wanted a large, they'd ask for a large."

Knicely said that many elderly customers were annoyed by his attempts to upsell. Yet upselling often worked on families and teens.

Carmike, which owned, operated or had a stake in 299 U.S. theaters in 2003, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in August 2000. It reorganized in June 2002, but its revenues dropped 2.6 percent from 2002 to 2003, according to a March report.

According to Carmike's 2003 annual report, concession sales are second only to admissions in company revenue.

"We actively seek to promote concession sales," the report said. One method listed is "training our employees to up-sell products."

The Wheelers and Knicely have moved on since their firings. Rachel Wheeler, a student at Virginia Western Community College, got a new job at a bookstore in Southwest County. Jonathan Wheeler is still unemployed.

Knicely, a rising sophomore at Roanoke College, is temping. He sometimes misses working at Carmike 10, even if he didn't love upselling.

"I didn't think it was a fair rule," Knicely said. But "I think it's a rule that needs to be followed.

"It was a good place to work. It was a good summer job," he added. When he got fired, "I was like, 'Well, what do I do now?'"