Vantaggi
* There are pretty decent benefits. Not as expensive as other companies offer, and the coverage is adequate. But if it's worker's comp, you're fully covered by the company for all expenses. * Most of the people you work with are really great, and you do usually become good friends if not just good coworkers. * You're a part owner of the company, since it is employee owned, which means you get stocks as well as dividend checks once a year. You can buy stock as well as earn it according to the amount of hours you work, so when you have a lot of stock, your dividend check is pretty nice. * The quarterly inventory bonuses are a nice thing to see. You just better hope that you're in a store that sells pretty well, but really I don't think even a lower sales store would get lower than $100 dollar bonuses per person. * Holiday pay is time and a half, and if you don't want to get the holiday bonus in cash, you can always switch it out to have an extra paid vacation day off (full-time employees only) * Sick time starts off with 40 hours, and if you don't use it in the year, it rolls over and accumulates. So you figure after 3 years of not being sick, you have a lot of sick time you can burn if you run out of vacation hours. * Vacation hours don't roll over but every 5 years of you working there, you acquire another week of paid vacation. * Every 5 years of working, you get to go to a luncheon where you get free food and a gift. The gifts get bigger and better the longer you've been working there, but even after the first 5 years, the gifts aren't too terribly cheap. Plus, you're paid to sit down and eat for a few hours! * Hiring within the company is great. Many people move up the ladder who haven't finished high school or even have a college degree, but you have a better shot of getting management if you do have a degree in business. * They do respect freedom of religion so if you need a day of worship, they will give it to you. * You do your job right, you get raises. A minimum of $0.25 every evaluation, which is twice a year. You do very well and you are liable to get more than that. Keep in mind that during these hard economic times most companies have stopped giving raises, so 25 cents may seem like nothing, but compared to actually getting nothing, it's definitely something and it adds up!
Svantaggi
* Some problems with the benefits is that they cover up to 80% of most minor things, but some things they won't cover at all. Cosmetic surgery isn't covered at all, as well as glasses that are rimless, because they are considered cosmetic, therefore not a need. * There's a lot of favoritism, unfortunately. A lot of people try to get into manager's back pockets so they can get out of doing work or to get out of getting written up when they do something wrong. I've seen it many times and in the different stores I've worked in. * Bonuses and overtime get heavily taxed. 48% or somewhere there about. * You have to be full-time to get paid vacation and sick time, so if you're a part timer and you get really ill where you have to be out of work for a while, be prepared to go without money for a while. * If you are on disability, it takes up to 3 months before you get paid for being out of work and then it is only half of what you normally get. This is only for full-timers who have applied for long-term or short-term disability. * There are many people who are promoted to management who don't do their jobs right and make everybody else work harder and more stressful. I've seen many newly promoted managers who just stand around talking or disappear from the department to go fool around on the clock rather than helping the short staffed department or doing paperwork. If you keep up with the paperwork, it shouldn't take more than 15 minutes, 30 minutes max if you're that slow. Not 3 hours. The thought of many people who are wanting to go into management is that once they get promoted they won't have to help out. This is the wrong way to think, you still have to help out, you just have to manage over everybody in your department as well as do your paperwork. You don't get out of everything just because you're a manager. * You do not have a set schedule in most places unless you are a part- timer and have requested it as such due to family/school/military reasons. Most full-timers are warned before they are allowed full-time that they must have open availability in order to become a full-timer. Not all stores are like this, but the ones I have worked in are.