I would give this company another 3-5 years before it goes belly up at least in the Northeast Ohio area. Day by day, the stores begin to look like how Tops looked like towards the end when they went bust and bankrupt.
Something is wrong when you go from having over 3,000 employees working at corporate to 1,300 people as of 2016, then you lay off an additional 300 at the beginning of 2017. Back in the day, corporate's hotline for both customers and employees to call when having issues used to be 24/7, now it's Monday through Friday 9-5 and if someone especially the employees are having serious issues, nobody can get a hold of corporate. We had a couple of those incidents. Right after the 2017 store closures, corporate was trying to buy out and force to retire anyone hired prior to 1992 to save on payroll. Then it seems like every month now, they are trying to get anyone making $12.50/hour or more to take a voluntary layoff. What that is all about is that they're getting tired of loaning out monies to stores having trouble making payroll to save themselves money and a lot of stores were asking for payroll help. If you see RCO or RTO training or something on the schedule, chances are, the store is borrowing money to pay you especially if you've been there a long time. Since 2011, they've closed at least 40 stores and one warehouse. That's red flags something's wrong. I noticed too that with Good Cents and with the stores they just opened in Indiana, it didn't last too long either and that shows that the company is struggling. Something's wrong when you close them 5 years after opening them. Then again when you go from having $10 billion in revenues down to $7 billion, you have to cut corners somewhere to recoup the $3 billion you lost.
I think management too at store level also sense that the company might be going belly up too because they are getting desperate for sales even if it means letting the customers get away with bloody murder. For example, we're not allowed to take photocopied coupons, but some stores are so desperate for money that they don't want to argue or upset the customer and have them not come back, but they'll put it through anyways. They are also allowing photocopied rain checks to be put through also to avoid arguments with customers even though it's a violation of corporate policy. Stores are letting a lot of stuff slide that they normally never used to and this is costing the store money. Some managers overlook the policy too, but not all, because they know the retail chain is in deep sh-- and they are at the point where they give zero f---s anymore. That's when you know something is wrong when you see nobody is caring.
It's gotten so bad that corporate had cut back on loss prevention and those guys are lucky enough to get any hours. Some of them quit because of the lack of hours. We're lucky to see our loss prevention dude twice a month-no wonder why people run out of there with tons of merchandise and then corporate wants to b--ch about why shrinkage is so high at the stores. No sh-- Sherlock, nobody's at the door and we're not allowed to chase after the shoplifters unless the employees want a fast track to get fired for doing so. We have to let them go. I find it odd however that their inner city stores have security 24/7 with cameras everywhere while the suburban stores rarely have cameras or security at all and the thieves see this and hit up the suburban stores more than the inner city ones. Some stores have been cutting back on hours of operation, getting rid of the nighttime cleaners, and cutting back on the 3rd shift people. That's why you see one or two cashiers now at the 24 hour stores. File maintenance has been shifted to early mornings now.
The food quality has gone to hell and a hand basket too from corporate cutting corners too. When you see micromanaging that hard core you know something's up.
If anyone is still working there get out while you can and this includes the ones who can retire but are hanging on year after year still working. When they close, they'll buy you out of your employment which means you lose your retirement. I know some sh-- is going on as well as many others and a lot of us are getting out when we can. Like I said, I'm giving them about another 3-5 years. Something's wrong too when Kroger's was trying to and still is trying to buy them out. That should tell you that they aren't doing well. I went through a few store closures and right before they closed, competitors looked at the store location. Then a year or two later, they closed the location. If competitors are looking at buying corporate, you know something's wrong.