Pros
I had worked as a part time associate at two different branches, and they essentially expect very little out of you. You are extra help, working like 20 hours a week. Nothing more, nothing less. The staff is very friendly and laid back and most people were cool to work with besides a few. Also, given that this was my first career opportunity out of college, I can't complain. You deal with SaaS essentially in very high-paced working environments, so ideally, when you leave after 1-2 years, it looks very good on your resume. You see every aspect of operations management, sales, finance, and go to some very cool accounts and meet some awesome people.
Cons
I am a sales personality type of person through and through. Fastenal simply does not give me that expectation when I want it. - Each branch only has 9-10 employees, and most have major random responsibilities (fulfillment routes). If one person calls off sick, well guess what, you are dropping everything you wanted to do that day and doing their work because management said so and their work is more important than yours. Sure boss, I'd love to drive 30 minutes away, restock 200 gloves into vending machines, rewire a few vending coils on the phone with tech support, which I was never trained to do, and then come back a few hours later to my desk with 8-9 emails from my own accounts asking me why I did not stop in to meet with them today so now I'm an entire day late on all my work! Awesome. - Branches are structured so poorly, which is why tasks vary for every branch. Most branches only have like 3-4 job titles, which all include "miscellaneous tasks," which explains why they kind of just throw you to where they need you because you can't complain. You will always have something thrown at you that you dont want to do, simple as that. - The pay and sales rewards are just so underwhelming and undeserving. I have made major major breakthroughs and sales and anytime a large order gets processed, I just get a "cool, nice job" and get zero commission for it. It's so frustrating. - For being a high paced sales job where I'm told to grow accounts, book meetings, head hunt, find uncovered opportunities, I dont make enough to have this load on me. Simple as that, Pay is super super low.