Pros
The customers are often friendly. Good staff discount.
Cons
You will be asked to work in stores you have no knowledge of alongside new colleagues who also do not know the store and will leave you in that situation one on one for 4 hours at the end of a busy night with no security. Fortunately I was able to refuse a situation where several teenagers came in wearing balaclavas. Shoplifting is rampant and the solutions offered do not work in reality. They need security. They offer no training so even if you have experience you will not necessarily know the computer systems and procedures Farmfoods uses and a quick demonstration then allowing the person to the do it under supervision of the trainer would solve this issue. The online training bares very little relevance to the actual procedures. They will also give you undertrained staff as it seems everyone just has to figure it out for themselves. The situations where I was presented with new staff meant that I had no time to train them and often I was reprimanded verbally when things weren't done quite right. The situation was never manageable and overall very stressful. There seem to be some staff who after 2 years still do not know how to do banking despite being a supervisor. This is also not a good way to support a new supervisor. Lack of phone signal in the building then means when you are given lack of support you have to go outside the building to contact another manager. They will then use the combination of lack of training, lack of support and lack of facilities to reprimand you. They will most likely use the excuse of "we have online training" but it actually bares little relevance to the actual procedures in the store and isn't a very effective training method. The hiring procedure seems to be an issue as most of the staff you work with see moving as an affront to their existence. So you are asked to make them work and told the other staff can manage it but you are never given the same staff as the manager or assistant manager nor the same numbers. Which is a fact I could easily prove it rotas weren't protected data. Any order or organization is actively resisted against by current managers who then make it personal. You should just show up, not fix anything and continue to work in systems which constantly cause issues for you and the customers and if you do not turn a blind eye you are seen as a problem. The current management seem to think coming in 2/3 hours before shift or staying behind 2/3 hours after their shift ends is not a sign that things are not working properly in the store. Many times you feel the pressure to stay behind just to avoid being reprimanded because even if you have legitimate reasons they are not accepted by upper management, at least not without a fight. I recall one night I stayed behind 3 hours and I had missed one or two sections because I had to get home. I was still reprimanded and asked why I thought it was acceptable to leave the store like that. I was understaffed and the staff I had don't really understand what is required. Even if you explain it to them it does not matter they think you are wrong because the other managers do not back you or follow through on any discipline procedures. It just gets very personal and petty. Just show up, do the bare minimum and let someone else take the fall seems to be the Farmfoods way. If you like disorganised environments and don't mind looking unprofessional. Then this job is for you. When we were closing the store Alan MacKenzie, Area Manager, exclaimed to the whole store when he saw an overweight person in the car park "F**k me look at the size of her. She'd eat me." I think that sums up the level of professionalism inside Farmfoods.