Pros
Plenty of hours around Christmas and summertime. Good discount and uniform allowance. Career progression but always kept on temp contacts.
Cons
Store managers don't look at holiday requests; you basically have to beg them to do their job and look at them; usually declined anyway so it is impossible to plan any holidays or have a social life. Absolutely no focus on staff and a horrible bullying atmosphere in store. Your entire day was depicted by the mood of your store manager that day. Expected to work all bank holidays and over Christmas which is understandable as it is busy, but the managers take it out on their staff that they also have to so it becomes a horrible environment. Our Store manager sat in the office all day long even leaving to get her hair done during her shift which meant the rest of the staff were buckled with the workload as she did nothing. Training which was supposed to be implemented in store never was, and stockroom staff actually had to call in environmental health as their working conditions were a disgrace (30 degree heat in stockroom when they arrived) I worked for this company from an xmas temp up to a full time sales manager and after 8 years was still on a temp contract; having to do basically all the other managers work as they were too comfortable with their permanent positions. The most enjoyable part was the relief of leaving.