Balsam Brands Reviews

Pros

Cared for Good Brand values Work life balance

Cons

Single dimensional Growth areas, mid range pay

Pros

Great benefits, medical, dental and vision are 100% paid for employee.

Cons

Culture. They have values that state "Create Joy", but don't really follow the values they setup. Recent layoffs blame the employees and not the leaders in charge. No responsibility from executive leadership. Everything is a priority, unreasonable expectations.

Pros

Amazing managers! This largely depends on what team you get placed on (some teams are notoriously poorly managed) but many managers are extremely attentive and supportive. Fun industry. There's a lot of creativity in a company like Balsam. Cool offices. The offices themselves were always decorated really fun and had a lot of character. It was always easy to make friends with people you worked with. Shut-down week is a cool concept (and very needed after a long season). PTO could certainly be better, but could be worse too.

Cons

Many of the incredibly talented people I worked with when I initially joined Balsam have left, usually citing low salary and poor work-life balance. This really hurts Balsam as its employees are the best part of working there. It is very difficult to enjoy the holidays when you have to work through them. This is somewhat mitigated by how slow the rest of the year is. However, it is still something to consider. HR seemed to constantly ignore employee misbehavior (especially managers) who were cruel to their subordinates, but instead constantly fired long-standing employees who were well-liked and performed well.

Pros

Health insurance is good, covers most things. Most people are nice to work with Work life balance is good except during in season from Sept - Feb.

Cons

Company is inconsistent. Talk about being a different kind of company, people first and relationship focused company but the first signs of missing sales plan and they lay off a lot of great people. No one is safe Pay is below market. This is probably the most consistent con you will hear. Reviews and promotions are not based on performance, more on personality. Some in senior leadership are not who they present themselves to be.

Pros

Flexible schedule except when we're in holiday season If we make plan, company retreats are great. (although its in lieu of cash) Many of my peers were great to work with

Cons

Low pay relative to market makes it hard to stay here. They try to add small perks like free daily coffee, but it doesn't make up for how underpaid we are. Fake positivity highly encouraged and enforced, and a lot of pretending to care about employees. However, recent layoffs showed the almighty dollar is what matters here despite what they pretend. Senior management is weak. Some good ones, but some that are extremely fake.

Pros

Benefits, you will get all the typical benefits you'd receive at other large companies 1 week off in off-season

Cons

Pay is well-below industry Internal resources are limited and Balsam does little to set up a team for success Small company with limited upwards movement, look outwards to move forward in your career Management leaves a lot to be desired Multiple layoffs in the past few years

Pros

Met some great people while working there.

Cons

The pay, toxic positivity, top heavy structure, lack of a straightforward corporate structure, introverts stay away, wacky, weird place, adults and company officers wearing onesies, and lack of certain important strategies.

Pros

Work life balance is good and encouraged (except during the holiday season). Medical benefits are great. Company getaways are amazing

Cons

The chaotic and bi-polar decisions made at the Sr. Leadership level make working at this company a nightmare on a daily basis. Constantly shifting roadmap, everything being the top priority, chasing every possible revenue stream without a plan while creating technical debt, compounded with unrealistic schedules and deadlines means no goal is ever met. Leadership never takes responsibility for their mismanagement.... they only shift the blame down.

Pros

Great culture, unique benefits, Christmas all year

Cons

Some communication issues, flexible work hours but have to accommodate for 4 time zones

Pros

I was fun working here

Cons

I really do not have anything