I’m a college student but have been working with this popular clothing retailer for four years now. I have been in a management position for over two years. I have barely seen a reasonable raise. I make a few more dollars an hour than I did when I started out at minimum wage, but it’s still not enough to cover cost of living. Many managers work 2 jobs and make more at the other one. Three of the five managers are making under what most retailers give starting out to cashiers. It’s sucks because my job is easy going some days and others it’s a lot to handle. I train new hires, sell like I’m on commission, do business side stuff, attend conference calls on my days off, I have a 45 minute round trip on days with no traffic. I tried to transfer to a closer location but I was begged to stay.
I applied to another retail management position so I finally can get paid a reasonable hourly wage. The company I work for always says we get compensated in good discounts, yet most of us long time employees barely use them since they only work in store and most of the product we get is sold out by the time we can get out hands on it, or it’s just unappealing to us. Most stores can’t hire new managers because they see the workload and then the pay and then decline the offer. I understand it’s retail, they pay like crap most times, but some companies are starting to pay a bit more. But it doesn’t mean they can’t pay a bit more to cover the basic living expenses, instead I get a nice 60% off discount on 10 items a month that I never use.