all the district managers i knew when i worked retail seemed to make a pretty good living... it depends heavily on how good the company you work for is, and how much they pay their store managers. almost all of them had to travel a hell of a lot, i know it was tough for the ones that had families. travel expenses for district managers are pretty much always on the company's dime, though.
the key to moving up in retail seems to be either sticking at one company, or having connections. my first promotion was all thanks to connections from my mom, who has been working in retail for about six years. in that time my mom moved up from assistant manager to store manager, although it probably would have gone faster if she'd stayed at one company (she had terrible luck with stores closing down and one company she worked for even went bankrupt). i knew people at Coach who moved up to management within two years, though, but that was usually due to a manager transferring to a new location or getting a promotion (managers at Coach don't typically quit that often, they make a lot of money).
