Genesco – “Journeys Co-Manager: Genesco should be ashamed of the way they run their company.”

Pros

If you like retail, the job in itself is fine. The discount is nice, but it is limited (which they forget to mention) so forget about holiday shopping. Put me in a room full of shoes and tell me to talk to new people every day about shoes and fashion and there's no way I could be unhappy!... (Unfortunately, Genesco found a way to make me unhappy.)

Cons

I've never been so miserable working for a company in my entire life. Which is really sad because I like the actual job and the people there. The company just isn't fair to their employees. I made 140 a week plus 4% commission on everything I sold. If that's not bad enough, the company makes the part-time hourly-paid employees reach sales goals too. Since they are paid hourly, they don't make commission on what they sell (or if they do it's very very small). So by making the hourly employees reach sales goals too, Genesco has found a way to take some sales away from co-managers and managers, so it's less commission they have to pay them.

They also over schedule management and under schedule hourly part-timers. Since co-managers get a base pay of just 140 a week, the company overworks them, so they don't have to pay as much hourly wages to the part-timers. So management is exhausted, overworked and underpaid, while part-timers are starved for hours.

They also flat out lied to me. When they hired me, they told me 45-50 hour weeks, so I accepted the job. I am working 55-65+ hour weeks... all for a tiny paycheck. I get one day off a week. I can't visit my parents and family who live out of state, I am not allowed to request a day off. I don't get compensated fairly for overtime as well.

I met and exceeded my sales goals, and when I got my paycheck it was like I was practically working for free considering the amount of hours I worked. The paycheck (even well you sell a lot) just isn't worth the hours.

Advice to Senior Management

I have to leave my job during the holiday season because I literally can't go on working like this. I liked the job and the people I worked with so I hate to do this to them. If this company was run half-decently, I wouldn't be leaving. If my DM was honest about the hours I'd be working, I would have never taken this job in the first place. Genesco, if you want to hire college graduates, be prepared to pay them an appropriate salary, especially if you are going to work them practically to death. If you don't treat employees fairly, they'll just leave. It's that simple.

Practically everyone in my store wants to leave. The part timers aren't getting enough hours, and the managers aren't getting enough money for their time. I'm surprised how this company is still around. This company should be ashamed of themselves.