Potbelly Sandwich Works Reviews

Pros

-Flexible schedule
-Great people to work with
-Bonus options
-Really good vacation package
-Easy uniform
-Really great potential to move up within the company, they like to help associates mature and grow

Cons

-50 hour work weeks REQUIRED for salary managers
-10 hour work days, everyday
-Assistant manager bonuses can be less than associates' bonuses depending on time in/store earnings
-No reimbursement for jeans/shoes, even though they are required
-Expected to work extra and sometimes outside of work, ie. training, traveling, going to other stores
-Capped at GM growth, no real platform to go from in the store to corporate if thats what you want
-A lot of management is undeducated (not all) which makes for GMs/AMs with poor business strategies

Pros

Very easy to request time off, half-off discount on everything, get to bring home extra cookies every night, time flies when it's busy, everyone that works there is awesome, I get a LOT of hours for a student

Cons

Have to pay for sandwiches :), dumb corporate rules, have to sit back and watch senior management make some pretty stupid decisions, very very late (12AM) closes once in a while, SERIOUS UNDERSTAFFING ISSUES that senior management seems to ignore to keep their labor score high, really bad training program

Advice to Senior Management

Give us an extra worker on nights you know it will be busy! During rushes it is extremely difficult to run the store with 3 people. Make the menu less confusing for customers. Most customers don't understand the Skinny/Thin-Cut difference.

Pros

It's a fun atmosphere in a downtown busy store. You get to speak with customers and they really appreciate what we do.

Cons

Hours are terrible. There are lazy co-workers. Management doesn't communicate with their associates effectively. It's a dirty environment and people don't really care.

Advice to Senior Management

Listen to your employees and give us better pay for the long hours and conditions we have to work in.

Pros

Flexibility in the schedule. no late shifts

Cons

No enough hours, poor salary \ and if u are a minute late be prepare for some bs.

Advice to Senior Management

Stop being so cheap!

Pros

Atmosphere is very welcoming and upbeat
Other employees are fun to be around
Live music breaks up the music playlist nicely.
Shifts move very quickly because you are usually busy.

Cons

Some of the managers are not that good, and are too involved in their personal lives to make the store a Great experience. Wage is not great but not horrible considering the usually nice environment as compared to other restaurants. bonus distribution is unfair. Staffing can be an issue. It really depends on the store. Some stores are amazingly run.

Advice to Senior Management

The store and its employees should be a priority to you.,especially the higher up you go. What you expect from your associates should also be how you act.

Pros

Great food, especially the hot peppers
Live music is fun

Cons

Ridiculous amount of company initiatives/roll-outs with little support, and most times incorrect signage/marketing materials.
They don't advertise to help bring in business.
Favoritism runs rampit in this company!
The company has a Napoleon Complex. Get over yourself, IT"S JUST A SANDWICH!

Advice to Senior Management

Don't believe anything the recruiter says! They will tell you whatever they think you want to hear to get you to work for them. And, nothing they promise is true. It was a much better company under Bryant.

Pros

The co-workers there were nice.

Cons

They expected me to be a superhero, and I had to do EVERYTHING.

Advice to Senior Management

Treat your employees better!

Pros

you can meet people that are fun to be around.

Cons

The moral in the whole company has gone completly down hill. It started off as a job that you could have fun at to a place that was cut throat for hours. One week you would have enough hours to pay your bills, and the next second you end up with just enough to fill up your tank to get back to work. The breaks between each shift was s long that you were basically spending all your time at work or waiting to get to work. Raises were barely even given and if you recieved them they were so small that you didnt know whether to laugh or cry. If you were favored, then you got the bigger raises, and promoted quicker. The people who were actully all about Potbelly ended up leaving, and wasting many years of their lives on broken promises made by this ever growing greedy company. It takes away any chance at a social life, and if you ask for a day off, you can forget about getting more hours. This company is so consumed with making money that they would rather no one really work to save on labor. Quarterly bonuses have gotten so small that there is no point in getting them, and promises of prizes for winning competitions are just ploys to get you to sell more.

Advice to Senior Management

Your employees are the ones making you money. They do all the grunt work. Show them the respect they deserve and get rid of all the dead wait. Misleading promises of promotions and raises only kill moral. Go back to the neighborhood resturant that it once was. Money is important but not at the expense of your employees.

Pros

Great food, awesome associates, hours weren't too late at night, live music, fun and lively atmosphere, and the uniforms were decent

Cons

Living the potbelly culture was cool years ago. It has become a cut-throat business of greed and undermining. Endless hours of hard work with no gratitude. Always having to do pointless endless paperwork every shift worked. Pay freezes, reviews that were given but not coherently with minimal feedback in between. So much info was emailed out daily and never stayed around long, do this ,change that, no dont do this anymore, oh wait now we are goin to do that again... Agh! Stop changing every little thing and sending a stupid email about an email! Never ending changes that rarely improved operations. Salaried management was ridiculous. They continued to hire hacks off the street who became detrimental to the store, and these people only looked out for themselves and didn't care who they stepped on along the way. Potbelly used to be cool and fun and a great place to work... Now it sucks! When potbelly and it's managers cared...that submarine sunk a long time ago.

Advice to Senior Management

Get back to basics! You should have never changed the dynamics of the company to focus on make more money! That completely shifted the culture that we respected and loved and turned it into an environment that was follows with endless pointless paperwork and soul- sucking. Senior management rarely visited the stores and when then never spent time with associates or leads to get their thoughts or concerns. The DM role is worthless...they just head off problems but never resolved the issues. It became cut- throat and promotions were few and far between and never went to the person who worked the hardest or was deserving. Pay freezes, sub par reviews and low merit increases hurt the employees morale. Outside hiring is the WORST idea!

Pros

My coworkers were great, and I loved testing out new types of sandwiches and soups. It was a stress free atmosphere to work in.

Cons

I didnt see myself going anywhere with the job. Management handled some issues poorly, distracting the workers from doing their jobs to the best of their abilities.

Advice to Senior Management

I advise that lower level management (stores) be checked on regularly and analyzed more in-depth. This is where the customers see what Potbelly is about.