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The Department of Retailing at the University of South Carolina offers a Bachelor of Science in Retailing with emphases in retail management and fashion merchandising and an industry internship. The program has a strong business and liberal arts core that prepares you for managerial, sales, and entrepreneurial careers in the retailing and fashion industries. Team building, communications, decision-making, and problem-solving skills are emphasized, and we offer more than 25 industry-specific courses. Faculty and industry experts teach in our classrooms. We combine studies in retail management, entrepreneurship, business, Internet retailing, and fashion merchandising with a comprehensive liberal arts education. Our department is known for the quality and quantity of its graduates, and we are considered a top-10 recruiting site by many of the nation’s leading retailers. In addition to the approximately 300 students who are majoring in retailing, the department has more than 150 students who minor in retailing.
Career Opportunities
The field of retailing is vast, with one in every seven employees in the United States involved in some phase of the industry. Here are a few of the possibilities:
• store owner/manager
• merchandise planner/marketer
• manufacturer’s sales representative
• retail buyer
• visual merchandiser
• fashion coordinator
The University Career Center is available to assist you in choosing a career direction and in increasing your marketability upon graduation. For additional information, call the center at 803-777-7280.
Admission/Progression Requirements
To be admitted into the College of Hospitality, Retail, and Sport Management’s Bachelor of Science degree program, you must meet all University admissions standards and College of Hospitality, Retail, and Sport Management requirements. University requirements for freshmen include a completed application, nonrefundable application fee, high-school record complete up to the time of application (including record of at least 20 units of study earned as required by the University), and entrance examination scores (either SAT or ACT). Details for all applicant categories can be found at the Undergraduate Bulletin. Further requirements may be imposed for admission to the degree program. The program consists of a lower division and an upper division, and acceptance into the University with a lower-division classification does not guarantee progression into the upper-division. As a freshman, you’ll be admitted to the lower division with preprofessional status until you are eligible for the professional division. A grade point average of 2.00 for specified courses totaling 45 semester hours is required for admission to the professional level.
Program of Study (122 hours)
The baccalaureate curriculum provides for eight semesters of study for the Bachelor of Science degree with a major in retailing (with options in retailing and fashion merchandising) and administrative information management. The curriculum for the preprofessional division requires 45 hours: 15 hours of general education requirements, 12 hours of retailing core courses, and 18 hours of University core requirements. Your degree requirements will include 33 hours of general education requirements from the liberal arts, 13 hours of mathematics and sciences courses (six of which must include numerical and/or analytical reasoning), and seven to eight hours of laboratory sciences. You are also required to complete 34 hours of major requirements, passing each course with a grade of “C” or better. Your required courses include Functional Accounting I, Functional Accounting II, and Retail Promotion. Additionally, you must complete 27-30 hours in retail management or fashion merchandising and 18 hours of minor or general elective courses. Nine to 12 hours of your cognate or minor courses should come from the College of Hospitality, Retail, and Sport Management. All students are required to complete a six-hour, semester-long internship approved by the department. All internships are supervised by a faculty member and require 300 hours of work in an international or domestic setting appropriate to your specialization. Successful internships often lead to full-time employment. Our students have completed internships with major retailers such as Rich’s, Parisian, Atlanta Apparel Mart, Lowe’s, Wal-Mart, Toys ‘R’ Us, Sears, and the National Retail Federation. USC also houses the Center for Retailing, whose mission is to interact with the business community through research, contracts and grants, service, continuing education, and public relations.
Of Special Interest
We offer the only retailing program in South Carolina and one of the few in the country that leads to a Bachelor of Science in a program that is management-oriented and provides opportunities for lucrative, challenging careers. Our small classes promote individual attention and group interaction. Exciting field studies could take you to major retailing centers worldwide, including Hong Kong, Rome, London, Paris, and New York. Our faculty members serve regularly as consultants for retail businesses and conduct workshops for the professional community. Because student advisement is a top priority in the department, you will work with the faculty advisor who has the most expertise in your area of interest, and you will keep that same advisor as you progress through the program.
Retailing Department's Web site