It works for them. - Sales Associate Guitar Center Employee Review

2.0
10 Jan 2009
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

It's a chance to meet other musicians with the same interest as you. You could use the product knowledge to land another job in the music industry or you could go sell cars and probably make more money. I worked with someone whose son was making more money delivering pizzas. Some think it's "cool" to work in a music store but the reality is that it's no different than any other job. It's hard for me to give best reasons to work at Guitar Center. It's worked for some people but it didn't work out for me at all. Good luck.

Cons

The pay versus the work. To work for commission only, with what Guitar Center pays, is a tough thing to do. Which is why they have such a high turn over rate. If you're a young, single guy or girl and you have roommates, you can probably make it work. But if you need a "real world" salary and have a family, it isn't a good move. Pretty much everything about working at Guitar Center is negative. I'm trying to meet the quote of this,so I'm going to keep typing until I make the quote they need, which will happen now.

Explore other reviews about Guitar Center

5.0
9 Jan 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Got to work with so many people

Cons

Long hours during holidays were rough

1.0
21 Apr 2026
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

- Plenty of capable individual contributors doing real work. - The brand and the business itself are legitimate — the problems are organizational.

Cons

- Senior leadership is politically driven rather than outcome-driven. Strategic initiatives stall out, and leaders spend more energy assigning or shifting blame than actually diagnosing and fixing problems. - Some parts of the org operate on deference to the top. Honest assessments get softened into whatever narrative leadership wants to hear, which makes real cross-functional work difficult. - Senior leaders do not consistently advocate for their own teams. When things get political, self-preservation takes precedence over backing the people underneath, and capable managers end up exposed.

2
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