Pros
I made very good friends that remain close, despite them all leaving the company also.
Cons
- Owner lacks business knowledge basic to running a company, making it impossible to work effectively - Owner is manipulative and oppressive - Owner micromanages managers and fails to let them make decisions - Owner uses tracking software to watch employees computer output - Owner fails to take responsibility for bad decisions, blames employees - Owner hires unqualified CEOs to the detriment of employees - No inhouse HR - Owner forces employees to participate in charity work on company time outside the office without paying for travel expenses. Many times charity involved physical labor - Extremely high stress in the workplace due to poor organization in meeting deadlines for orders - Favoritism - Unfair business practices concerning vendors - Questionable immigration statuses of workers - Pay increases were denied due to poorly run system failing to make a profit I cannot describe how horrible this environment was. The employees hated working there so much that most of the day was used to complain or wonder why such a bad job was done running the company. Employees dreaded when the owner was there because she was extremely negative and intrusive. She belittled every single employee she spoke to, and had a knack for alienating everyone. The company motto of "feel good/karma/love" is a huge joke and is laughed at by the employees. It was surreal how the company purported to be a "fun working environment" but was so negative that drama ensued every single day. Backstabbing and gossip is par for the course here, the tone being set by the owner, who also took part in this behavior. The product itself is just copies of other famous designers designs and put on cards that have "uplifting" messages. The sales/creative team upstairs was treated entirely different than the production team downstairs. In fact, when food was catered to the upstairs, whatever was left was taken to the production people downstairs, regardless of how old it was. I was management there. The monetary compensation for the amount of resposnsibility and stress I was put under was horrifying. When I gave a months notice (because I felt bad leaving my immediate supervisor high and dry) I was told to leave the same day, despite the fact that other employees had given the same notice. DO NOT WORK HERE. EVER.