Sur La Table Reviews

Pros

Great brand!
Amazing discount!
Growing company with upward mobility!
Bomun program pays out!
Al ot of room to think on the job.

Cons

Hard work.
A lot of ambiguity
lots of change

Advice to Senior Management

Slow down the floor moves as well as the price changes - we do a lot of $.04 mark ups that feel like a waste of time!

Pros

Great discount - although the electric could be better
Customers are great
Lots of gadgets

Cons

Micro Management
Corporate office has NO CLUE what is going on in their own stores. How can a store in NC be expected to do the same amount of money as a store in Atlanta? Impossible.
Constantly using the economy is not an excuse for lack of sales.
Praise is never given... never comes from "on high" unless you are an A store. the lower stores are just forgotten.
Need more of what is offered in the catalog.

Advice to Senior Management

Praise your employees! Upper Management get a clue and show how much you like your employees working for you. Not every state is CA and shouldnt have to abide by those laws!
Get the antique POS out and put in something that works.
Hire managers that arent dictators, but are willing to be flexible.
Let us work more than 4.5 hours a week... otherwise its not worth the drive. How much is gas where you are? Oh wait.. you make 100k a year so it doesnt matter.

Pros

discount 40% off, dress code and other associates, customers are fun. lots to do.

Cons

now it is a really negative enviroment with new management. constanst complaining from management about company and other team members. only promote "friends/girlfriends" to other positons. inapproiate mangement conversation and behaviors with staff. manager says she gets no support and does not like other managers in other stores.

Advice to Senior Management

listen to team and if it is as bad as the managers say you need to adjust your business goals. some training for managers on basic behavior is needed or some sort of hotline that we can call to report. just because you sell a 3000 coffee machine does not mean your working harder than someone else.

Pros

I love working at Sur La Table because it's one of the few places where you can still get recognition for working hard and thinking on your feet. The company is small, and still feels very entrepreneurial.
The product is very fun if you have an interest in cooking too.

Cons

The product can be overwhelming...there's a lot of it!
Never seems like there is ever enough time to gt everything done.
Not a lot of operational procedures.

Advice to Senior Management

It would be great to see more culinary programs in new stores.
In-stire cooking classes really make selling a whole lot easier!

Pros

Good discount on some items. Co-workers are hard working, focused and very nice people who enjoy helping customers.

Cons

No support of employees. No recognition. You are never good enough. There is a terrible lack of organization. Employees are not respected. The micromanagement of everyday operations is frustrating. Not enough staff to run store properly. Filthy, filthy, filthy. Reports, reports and more reports. Too much inventory in a too-small place adds to the disorganization.

Advice to Senior Management

Show some respect to your employees. Staff wants to do a good job, customers most often compliment associates and thank them for their expertise. Management needs to do the same. Don't treat employees like slackers. Statistics show that employees who are treated well add to the
success of a business. Provide equipment and resources to make stores run more smoothly.

Pros

Generous discount. 40% off full retail price, 1 electric per month.

Relaxed dress code.

Great clientele.

Free coffee from the Jura and Nespresso machines.

Now and then there are snacks to sample in the back if not on the floor.

Cons

• Benefits begin and end with the discount.

• I have worked for Sur La Table since May 2011, as both a culinary assistant and a sales coworker, and have never received any kind of training, orientation, or even employee handbook.

• When I transferred to the sales floor two months ago, the store manager informed me that pay starts at $10 hourly. I've been making $9.50 ever since.

• Very little opportunity for advancement.

• With a few exceptions, unhelpful if not combative management team.

• Management largely incapable of thinking for themselves. Unless it's on a spreadsheet, it doesn't exist.

• Require full-time availability, but most weeks only give 4-8 hours per coworker. I thought this was a store policy (a previous store manager was fired because the staff incurred too many meal break penalties) until reading the other reviews on this site.

• Weekly schedules are made on Monday, based on sales and forecasts, and must be approved by district manager and not issued until Wednesday. Schedules are seemingly revised at will—last week I was told an hour before my shift that I had been called off because numbers had not been met.

• Was told that I could not have my schedule e-mailed to me, as it constitutes working from home—even though other jobs in the past have done this. Have yet to find a state or federal law that supports this.

• Most shifts last only 4 hours. My store is located in a premium shopping center in a busy part of town where street parking is difficult to find. Arriving to work requires on average an hour in drive and parking time, or spending $9 at the mall parking garage to work 4 hours at $9.50 per hour.

• Never seen a major chain retailer so poorly organized. My store employs a full-time stockroom manager as well as a full-time merchandising manager, yet the stockroom always looks like a bomb went off. Inventory is stashed wherever there is room on the floor with no rhyme or reason. I can't begin to count the number of items that are not priced.

As a result, countless man hours in productivity and sales are lost every day because we can't find the product within our four walls, or spend peak time horsing around between the company site and the archaic POS system looking for prices on items.

Advice to Senior Management

It's really quite sad that Corporate chooses to operate based on their balance sheet and executive bonuses, because this could be such a great place to work and for the customer an even better place to shop.

People are the most valuable resource of any organization, yet it seems that staff are not worth as much as the $3,000 coffee machines they push us to sell.

It costs money to make money—invest in your staff and your stores, give them the resources needed for success. Quit trying to squeeze nickels out of pennies.

Allocate an advertising budget to the culinary program. Realize the difference between stores and local markets—you can't compare Farmer's Market to Newport Beach because the demographics are night and day.

Pros

co-workers on the store level, great discount, interesting products, making customers happy, relaxed dress code, use of demo coffee machines, nice store atmosphere

Cons

upper-management out of touch with the reality of the stores, disorganization from the top down, poor product allocation for the store capacity, constantly changing directives, micro-management from upper-management, cumbersome hiring process, non-existent training process, insufficient payroll to staff stores

Advice to Senior Management

Listen to feedback from the store-level. Trust the managers you hire to do their jobs. Stop tracking every single metric - adding an action to an already full work day will not help get things done. Remember that your store managers are not just sitting at a computer but are constantly being interrupted by the phone, sales associates, and customers... They are running a store.

Pros

It is a Hobby job. If you love to cook and love gadgets it is great.

Cons

Structure for training and improvement is limited and advancement is political.

Advice to Senior Management

That employees be give time off the floor to read and learn materials related to the job. That it be clear on how advancement and scheduling is done.

Pros

Discount, Dress Code and Products.

Cons

Constantly changing directive.
Reporting that is overwhelming and ensures manager has no time to train associates and run the floor.
Unrealistic expectations for tasking and payroll.
Motivation through negative feedback and being "made an example of" within the company.
Unprofessional communications from upper management including crude language and vulgarity from the top down.
Stores that are not built to handle the amount of inventory allocated.

Advice to Senior Management

Inspire and delight your teams, build a real vision and culture and develop loyalty within your retail teams and staff. Many associates stay for love of the product but not for love of the company. Your teams are not loyal to you they are loyal to your vendors, find out why.

Pros

Sur La Table is a great place to work in my opinion. The company recognizes performance and allows you to run the stores like your own business(with guidelines). They provide a great discount and provide you with plenty of training.

Cons

Not many, can be a stressful fast paced job. It's definitely not for everyone. Occassionally there can be frustrations, but I have never had a job without them.

Advice to Senior Management

Keep listening and being approachable. Keep driving the business to be a strong brand, I'm proud to work for a company whose leadership team has great business sense and has done what you have with the brand.