If I were James Daunt, I’d read this carefully.
I have been talking to B&N employees from all over the country and they have been airing their grievances in huge numbers. Management has been ignoring employees’ issues and they are enraged and are planning to take action.
The best workers are quitting in record numbers and the stores are losing sales just as quickly. Store managers don’t seem to care. It’s as if they know the company will be closing down soon.
Here are just some of the things employees are saying:
Anyone else losing employees fast and frustrated? Our store lost four in two months, and I heard word that four more are beginning to debate whether or not they should quit. We're understaffed by 10 people currently. I worked 31 hours labor day week, made time and a half labor day, didn't even make $300. I'm so tired. We have to take on more and more work the more people that leave and I feel like us as employees are sort of getting the short end of the stick here. NO IDEA what we're going to do come seasonal. We're busier than we've been in a long time, and we won't have nearly the amount of staff we did last season. Feeling really bummed and honestly just pure exhausted right now.
Management treated me like cr-p and continuously put me down during reviews for "not catching on," "asking too many questions," "being anxious" -- as it turns out, I was an undiagnosed autistic adult and struggling day in and day out under the harsh lights, constant masking, over-stimulation, intimidation from upper management (store manager and assistant store manager, only), horrible treatment from customers, and unrealistic metrics we were supposed to live up to. Not to mention, I was working upwards of 40 hours a week (always 38 or 39) and never had any benefits, 401k, or vacation or sick time. If I asked for time off, I had to provide justification - especially if it was inconvenient to management. SO not legal.
I implore everyone working for Barnes and Noble to seriously look within yourself and ask why you're sticking around. Corporate has their heads up their you-know-what if they think they're doing anything to attract new booksellers and employees. In retail, it starts and ends with what you're making (including benefits), how you're being treated by management, and your daily quality of life.
Upper management is bad. District manager was constantly coming out to have conversations. My dear friend ultimately left this particular store after the store manager called her ugly.
I have worked at BN for more than 17 years. I currently make $0.28 more an hour than someone hired today. And I'm asked to train that person. Every day I think about quitting. It's beyond frustrating.
We lost like 12 employees including me (oops lol) in the span of about two weeks and have since lost three more than I know about, since August 14th. We're getting tired and burnt out and quite frankly, while Barnes was the best job, I and a lot of other coworkers have ever had, it's not worth it, especially right now. We don't get paid enough, and no one is changing anything to ensure that WE'RE happy.
Mass exoduses are usually a sign of bad management.
I’ve only been here 2 years to figure out that Barnes and Noble doesn’t care about their employees.
My breaking point came when we were down to two cafe employees with no cafe manager, no help from management, and then told we're not doing a good enough job.
This one particular person [store manager] absolutely TANKS everyone’s morale (including other managers) and yet it doesn’t seem to matter.
No one deserves that kind of treatment or any other kind of work abuse we endure.
We should’ve started a union years ago, would a walkout be effective? I’m sure the press would love a big national event like that and B&N could use the publicity. Okay, well, maybe a different kind of publicity.