Typical day is weird, if you work very early like management does before the store opens don't expect to get in early like you're suppose to. Some people start at 7 and Management takes their time getting to work past the hour that most people have to clock in at 7 AM. Not all of them though however, there are two who arrive on time but the rest don't seem to care. A couple of them, mainly one have a real rotten attitude early in the morning and is easily angry when things aren't going right in the front or back room.
A typical day at work is trying your best to reach a goal which is very highly expectation of the front and back. Unrealistically high goals that people cannot achieve despite what Management says, and they will tell you that other stores apparently have "no problem" reaching these goals. Working in the backroom you can tell that the layout which is supposed to be efficient is not efficient. It's cramped, little space to work and when things get backed up it only gets worse. Cardboard boxes, which have to be emptied and thrown out to the side at the wall has to be carried over to the trash compactor in the corner which is often blocked off by wall decoration boxes or trash in general because the person who unloads the truck has to take the time to throw the trash out while having to keep up. Mind you, the truck is long, at first it's no problem keeping up until you're deep in the truck and have to squeeze by all the furniture that has to be left inside the tr
ProsFriendly co-workers, alright management, decent 10% employee discount, personal hours after 2 years of work for part-timers.
ConsUnprofessional, sometimes hazardous, unrealistic expectations, constant changes in work style.
Simply put, work is unbalanced and somewhat not worth the effort for all the BS you go through. It opened up as a new store 7 months ago and I've been there since the very beginning. Growth showed promise, but progress has only gotten worse. Management is a mess. Store manager is fantastic, but ASMs are confused, with assistant managers often delegating responsibilities the store manager would disagree with, and if you're aware of the miscommunication you still have to follow incorrect orders only to spend hours fixing the screw-up you were ordered to do. And no matter what, the ASM's are "always right" when the store manager isn't there. Management also has impossible expectations of everyone and when those expectations aren't met then they assume you're not working hard enough. Even though you have 5 other things on your immediate list of things to do, and constant customer service being at the top of that, you're supposed to do what they ask of you, no excuses. Many days the store is so busy me as a coordinator I'm stuck at the front as a backup cashier for 5 out of my 8 hours yet am supposed to merchandise all 7 of my departments, flow all products out of the backroom, recover all of my departments and ensure it stays well-kept, give "highly satisfying" customer service, shop for customers over the phone, and all else managers asked me to do that day. It's impossible, yet if you don't do it all, it shows up in your review. I'm constantly being told by my coworkers that my
ProsStore manager is a great boss, some of the team is very social and love to joke around.
ConsImpossible management expectations, low payroll, few workers, uneducated workers, etc
Great starter job for people in school (Detailed Review!)
My coworkers are great, we all get along fairly well. The hours are really flexible, but they change the schedule constantly during the week and sometimes don't even tell you, which makes it hard to make plans. They only schedule one week in advance (so you have the current week and then they create the schedule that Wednesday for the next week). There are constantly holes in the schedule so they end up adding shifts or deleting shifts and calling people in or out. The work is fairly easy. Mostly everyone will be trained in at least two areas of the store (I am now trained for every department). Cashiering, management is very strict about asking if customers have our credit card, even if the customer is just buying a bag of chips. We have to ask EVERY SINGLE CUSTOMER and try to sell the card after the customer says no. There is a goal for each week/month and during the evening shift, if we don't have anyone signing up, they put a ton of daunting pressure on you as if it all relies on you. It can get pretty hectic because it is usually just one person at the registers, so you are constantly calling up back up people (if you have any). Processing (not on the truck) is fun in moderation, but on the truck processing is awful because of the heat during the summer. Flow is easy and markdowns are fun. Cash Office on the other-hand is not for me. I did not enjoy it but if you can keep calm better than me, you should be fine (usually only for valued employees, but may depend on the ma
Fun place to work, but low pay, not enough hours, little feedback from management.
It's a pretty good work environment for a retail job. Most of the people I work with are fun and friendly. The customers love our store and treat the sales associates with warmth and respect. The work load and work pace are fairly reasonable. While there are times when you need to hustle, compared to other retail jobs, it's not bad -- pretty low stress.
The upper management provide limited direction and oversight. They certainly don't breathe down your neck or micromanage. If you're working the sales floor and there's no new merchandise to flow or special projects to do, you can kind of do your own thing, circulating around the store to help customers while straightening up whatever dept. or isle you choose to work on. The store itself is bright and welcoming with wood floors, good lighting, and white walls and ceiling tiles -- much nicer than a cold, sterile big-box store like Walmart. Unlike some employers, who demand open availability while only providing part-time work, Homegoods is great about working around your schedule. Some of our people only work one or two days per week. This schedule flexibility is very helpful if you work a second job, which you'll probably need to do since Homegoods probably won't provide you with the hours you need even if you're available 24/7.
This leads me to some of the not so good things about this job. All store employees below management level are part time, and I don't mean 20 hours per week. Sure, you may get 20 or even close to
ProsFriendly workmates and customers, Nice welcoming work enviroment, Not too stressful, Plenty of autonomy when completing tasks, Schedule flexibility - only work the days you want to work.
ConsLow salary, few hours, uncertain upward mobility, lack of positive or meaningful feedback from management.
Perfect place for anyone except the ones looking to make a living
I've been working here for almost two years now, and I can't complain too much. Almost all of my co-workers are beyond friendly, and very polite, easy to get along with. We get a lot of seasonal college students, and some are very hard workers, while others are complete slackers. A typical day for me is just pushing merchandise onto the floor. We are constantly getting new merchandise, 2-4 times a week, so it can become very tedious to do this every day, all day long. Especially since we are not allowed to have any stock in the back just sitting around. Depending on the manager on duty, a certain amount of stress is pushed on you. The managers are all very friendly, and connect great with their associates. I can honestly say I've rarely seen any of them have "off" days. And the days that they aren't feeling it, they don't push that negative energy onto us, which I appreciate greatly. The main manager of the store can get kind of stressed sometimes, and it affects us at times, but I can understand where he's coming from, having HIS boss onto HIM. The waterfall effect. In his defense, our store ratings and OSAT is always beyond great, so it all pays off in the end.
Hours and scheduling can get a bit silly at times. You get your schedule 3 days before the new work week, which isn't that helpful to begin with. 98% of the time, you are asked to stay later or come off on your day off, even if it's your only day off that week. This is the way it's always been, and it can become ag
ProsFriendly co-workers, GREAT management
ConsVery poor scheduling, sometimes you don't feel appreciated
In my time at HomeGoods I found it overall to be a fairly nice place to work, my other co-workers were friendly and easy to get along with, the management were just really awesome, the store I worked at we had three shift managers two were a pleasure to work with, the third was a bit crack the whip take no prisoners type, she was a new manager so I gave her a break on that front.
The wages we got was the minimum for the state (7.50 an hour) and you really could not afford to live off it without some major help, the cost of living in the area was much higher then the pay would allow, barely had enough to support myself and pay my share of utilities, had to go some days without eating just to make ends meet.
Now I said it was demanding only because I worked in the backroom often times processing shipments we got in, we had not lifts and had to team lift several heavy packages, there were times we got too busy to do this because someone called out sick and one person really could not do it alone, the only way we really had to move packages that were heavy, other then team lift them was to place them on a cart.
It was also very fast paced in the backroom, you had to work fast to unpack your boxes that were on your line, otherwise you would start to back things up for everyone, it was easy once you started to get the hang of it though.
Dealing with some customers was a bit of a drag at times, many bought furniture that was too large for their car, we had to make do th
ProsSome benefits for full time, employee discount, potential to advance.
Consbare minimum base pay, lots of effort requiring multitasking abilities, dealing with even the most unpleasant person with a smile and thank you.
3.0
Merchandise Coordinator | Allen, TX | Mar 22, 2021
Love my Co-Workers - No Vision
I have worked as a Merchandise Coordinator at HomeGoods for over 3 years. When I first started the vision and objectives for merchandising were clearly laid out and each task was prioritized by our Merchandise Manager. The store is a very high volume store and having a plan for flowing merchandise efficiently while maintaining a pleasant and safe shopping experience for our customers took top priority. We were given the time and means to accomplish our goals. In a post Covid era shop-ability has flown straight out the window. The amount of merchandise we receive weekly far outweighs our ability to move it onto the floor in time for the next truck arrives without total chaos ensuing😑. Our hands are tied with respect to creating crowd drawing displays and forget about maintaining shop able aisle space. The directive is always “just get it out on the floor”. It’s sad and embarrassing. I have had several customers ask “what in the world is going on with this store?” Indicating that it’s hard to find what they are looking for and hard to walk down the aisles without running into merchandise. This leads to huge increased damages. I feel like I hear something breaking in the store every 15 minutes. On top of that, the full time merchandisers are now tasked with retrieving and pushing carts to our counterpart TJMaxx. We can barely get anything done because someone will call for carts every 5 minutes. They don’t pay very well and the work is very physically taxing so it’s h
ProsMy coworkers are the best humans!! Paid time off. Paid Covid leave. Benefits package.
ConsPay, no direction, no clear objectives, general manager, no growth, terrible pay
If you value your time this is not the place to work. As a college student, I have worked various part-time jobs and genuinely enjoy it primarily due to the constant interaction with the customers. If you compare HomeGoods to other part-time jobs, many pay more and require less. The biggest negative here is the lack of appreciation for the value of their employee's time. They expect you to essentially dedicate your life to them. For example, it is not uncommon (nearly everyday) for them to beg you to stay for an exuberant amount of extra hours after every shift before you clock out. If you are someone who can't say no, then you will be taken advantage of. I've seen it first hand and didn't appreciate how it made my co-worker feel. Also, your availability means very little, at least at the location I'm referring to. Be prepared for them to add you to the schedule at 5 am. As a college student, this is not manageable long-term.
Another aspect of the company that turned me off was how they approach dictating who does what. During my interview, one of the managers said "you're attractive, you would be best at the front of the house." After working there for some time, I realized that she does that with everyone. Those who don't fall into the social construct of "beauty" are in the receiving room, apart of an assembly line for their entire shift. While this is not the only company that does this, it was my first time experiencing it. Not a fair practice!
While I can't speak for
Welcoming environment,management can be iffy at times.
Co workers are welcoming and inviting,Managers are okay.Making Schedules for people and handling people's RTO's seems to be a problem with them.There was a lot of times where I wasn't given a lot of work days and found out that new coworkers were getting more days than myself.I was told in the beginning,that after 6 months I would receive a raise but,never got it only because I wasn't good about selling credit cards despite being told numerous times that my work performance was excellent and that I worked hard. I've worked at jobs where I've done almost the same amount of work that they have us do at home goods,its just that they make you do so much and pay mediocre.Training was alright but,it was like they didn't care to make sure you understand everything.During training they would tell me it's okay if you don't know how to do it because,you can just ask a coworker when you don't know what to do.It's nice that I can lean on my coworkers but,it wasn't cool when we were really busy(which happened a lot) and I needed help with something that I was ill-informed about.It sucks when you got frustrated and impatient customers looking at you mad because,you don't know what to do,then when you ask for help from a coworker who has been working far longer than you have,why is it that they don't even know what to do either?There have been numerous times when,I've called the managers on duty for help and because a customer requested to talk to a manager,Just for me to be left awkwardly
Co-workers made day productive, kept busy, sometimes challenging in a good way
A typical day at Homegoods was busy. There was not a lot of lull time as merchandise never ceased to be flowing in. It created challenges to try and create displays and to be creative when space was limited. It was both enjoyable at times, and slightly stressful at other times. I learned that I was creative when it came to coming up with displays to feature new merchandise. This was all done without a plan-a-gram, to which I've heard other companies use to create displays. I received many compliments from both coworkers and customers alike.Also, being trained on registers, I learned how to manage with customers who are being less than friendly regarding a less than favorable situation, whatever that may be. Having worked there for over 10 years, I have seen 11 different store managers come into the building, so I think I'll leave my thoughts on management there. What I have learned from them, is how I would have handled a situation, be it with a customer, or coworker. I believe hard work should be awarded, as oppose to kissing up. My coworkers were downright awesome. Everyone I worked with throughout the years were great. Not all, a few bad apples here and there, but overall it was nice to work with all of them. Many looked to me for answers, so they did not have to face management. And even though I was never promoted to management, many who I worked with saw me as such. Which again, was nice, and a bit ego boosting, but also frustrating as I was never truly p
ProsCreativity, Coworkers
ConsUpper Management, Management, Rate of Pay, Lack of Proper Training
Questions And Answers about HomeGoods
If you were in charge, what would you do to make HomeGoods a better place to work?
Asked Feb 26, 2018
I would want to provide better cross-training for all employees and emphasize ‘best practices’ for teamwork work strategies so as to meet daily merchandise flow ’ quotas without burning people out !
Answered Oct 4, 2021
Better pay for all employees , let all employees rate the management to reflect there raises. Listen and follow through all complaints from call center.
Answered Aug 31, 2021
What is the work environment and culture like at HomeGoods?
Asked Aug 1, 2016
It is stressful , they talk down about the employees, everything is so unorganized and the communication is next to nonexistent. The store is ran by people who do not truly care about their associates but about credit cards and their own image. Things need to be changed or the store will see the results of these bad conditions in the long run. It’s not worth the stress.
Answered Jan 15, 2020
Used to be good but fell off dramatically. Currently a horrible, stressful place to work, would not recommend!
Answered Nov 21, 2019
What advice would you give the CEO of HomeGoods about how to improve it?
Asked Nov 11, 2016
Give employees time for training, at least an hour every other week
Answered Sep 14, 2020
Whenever someone in corporate comes up with an idea for stores to implement, they should run it by some long time employees in actual stores to see if it would work in “real world” situations. And I’m not talking about just running it by managers. Try running it by managers AND a back room coordinator, a merchandise coordinator, and your front end coordinator. They all come across different situations and they could offer plenty of input. Thanks.
Answered Jun 15, 2020
How long does it take to get hired from start to finish at HomeGoods? What are the steps along the way?
Asked Jul 9, 2016
3 days. Applied on Sunday. Got a call back on Monday for an interview. Tuesday, was hired on the spot as soon as I met the manager, no questions asked.
Answered Oct 6, 2021
3 days here, Fill out Application online, then called in interview. Hired on the same day. Start a week later. I would say one week total from start to finish
Answered Jun 21, 2019
If you start on Tuesday do you get paid on Friday or is there a week in the hole?
Asked Nov 29, 2016
There's no week in the hole. If you're paid weekly you woudn't get a check that first Friday because it's for hours worked the previous week (when you weren't employed) The following Friday you'd get a check for Tuesday - Friday of the first week you worked. The Friday after that, you'd get paid for the 5 days you worked during your second week of employment. You're always getting paid for the previous week's hours; companies need time to process payroll and get the deposits sorted. It's illegal to hold wages and that's not what's happening.
Answered May 21, 2019
There is no "hold"... You are creating your time slip one week and that pay is recieved the following week.
