Alright now the bad stuff. As many positives as ALDI had, there were also a LOT of negatives. The job is a hard job compared to many other retail or grocery jobs today. If your stocking the expectation was that you put 2 pallets away every hour. You really need to move fast and think about where things go as you plan your route through the store with each pallet. Drops and spills kill your time also, so you really gotta be careful as well. After all the load gets put away your timed on register, they want you to be fast and efficient while still not totally destroying the groceries as they go in the cart. Finally you need to keep the store looking nice, clean and sanitize surfaces, help customers find items, clean up spills and cover your employees breaks. I was a shift manager so I didn't do as much register service but I did a lot of everything else. If you are looking for a clipboard manager job don't work at ALDI you will be doing everything even if you become a Store Manager. There is also ZERO way to become corporate from stores. If you ever want to not be putting away pallets don't make it a career job. They hire all the DM's right from college.
Now all this takes a lot of training which they do provide, but even if you succeed and become a solid employee its a hard life. You get little cuts and scars, you need to lift properly or your back will hurt, and customer service is just a lot to put up with sometimes. All this would be fine- but one major thing changed in my time at ALDI. Was it worth it?
At the start it was. I started making $13/hr as a stocker and $17/hr after I became a shift manager. That was in 2018 when most jobs paid like $8-10/hr. When I left ALDI in 2020 I was making the same amount, for the same high skill job- BUT wages went up by so much everywhere else, it wasn't worth it anymore. If Target, Chick-Fil-A, Kroger and Hobby Lobby are paying $15 starting for entry level, easy jobs; then ALDI should be paying $21-22 for stockers and $26+ for shift managers. But wages haven't gone up by much, they did raise them after I left but only by a few dollars to be on par with what you could get elsewhere. In fact they actually CUT shift managers pay in 2020. Yeah- they CUT pay by $2/hr. Premium work deserves premium pay, and that just dried up over the last 2 years at ALDI.
Just a few other negatives you should be aware of. (These could have changed since I left but as of December of 2020 these were the case)
-There is no employee discount
-There is no music in stores (though you can use headphones before the store opens)
-The customers were VERY petty, sometimes arguing over amounts less than a dollar, and often times were degrading to the staff.
-Was often very short staffed
-Didn't have the best equipment (forklifts, scrubbers, scanners)
-Some stores had very toxic workplace environments
-Didn't give Christmas or holiday bonuses
-DMs watched cameras to criticize employee performance and almost never to catch shoplifters
-There is no way to get promoted to an easy job like main office, or district manager from stores
Overall the job can be good. You learn a lot, you are really active, most mangers I had were good and genuinely cared about the staff. (your mileage may vary of course) I would actually recommend ALDI as a first job, especially if you were young or right outta highschool. Its also a good job if you gotta get back on your feet or want to work a lot of overtime. But I wouldnt make it your #1 choice, apply elsewhere if you can be picky, and if you want something easy or low stress I wouldn't bother- its a hard job and unless things have changed the upper management does not appreciate its hardworking employees. In my eyes they saw us as replaceable resources and didn't fight to keep longtime workers.
