This job feels like riding a seesaw. You experience a lot of ups and downs (usually downs) working here. The company tries to make it seem like they really care about their employees when they really don't.
They shackle you down with "golden cuffs." The discount is decent, you get occasional free items called "gratis/training products" (which they are changing to giving less and less), and the hours are flexible... but some of the things you have to deal with working here just aren't worth it.
Upper management is/can be very passive aggressive, petty, and pushy. Lower management/"CEL"/key holders tend to abuse the little power they do have when upper management isn't around and tend to take their frustrations out on Beauty Advisors... and the mini managers omg. BAs who have been with the company for a long time like to breathe over newer employees or constantly overstep boundaries acting like they are in a management or leadership positions.
It just seems like the company as a whole is missing the mark on who they're hiring to work in their stores. People are constantly not pulling their weight, are straight up lazy, or just disappear for their entire shift... and management doesn't do a thing about it.
There is A LOT of favoritism and pettiness that happens on and off the floor. Even in front of clients/customers.
Hours and pay is also another negative thing about the company as a whole. You can be hired as a part time employee, work over 40 hours a week, and not re
ProsDiscounts, free items, flexible hours
ConsSchedules not set, pettiness, favoritism, poor management
I've always wanted to work at Sephora and was excited when I was hired on as a seasonal member. I frequently shopped at Sephora and I'm even a VIB rouge member so I thought working there would be fun. I was wrong.
Because I was at a smaller location they had to cut all of the employees hours so I only got 1 day of training out of the scheduled 4 days. Then the following week I was scheduled my first shift. I had a blast the first day, I loved interacting with customers and playing in makeup and since I am knowledgable about a majority of the brands this job was very easy for me. The downside however was I was just kind of thrown in the situation and I felt that the seasonal employees aren't treated as highly as the permanent employees are.
The shifts are only 5-6 hours and you are only scheduled 2-4 times a week. The pay is horrible for what they expect of you. They practically pay you minimum wage. It is not commission based either so it is hard to tell which members are really the sales people and are actually doing the work. Not everyone there is a makeup artist and you have to be certified by Sephoras standards in order to do makeovers on clients.
The Coworkers can be fun but also drama filled and catty. They would talk about guests a lot on the headsets which I thought was really unprofessional and rude. The managers are the worst and will micro manage like crazy. They are constantly on the head sets telling you about sales and how we need to push the custome
A typical day at work consisted of coming in around 5 a.m. once or twice in the week and leaving around 11 a.m. From that time frame, I would unpack incoming shipment with my team members and stock gondolas (makeup displays) and make sure each brand was displayed to perfection. Also, I would get ready to change positions and go on stage (selling floor) as a beauty adviser where I would greet clients that come into my area and make sure they are well taken care of, and eventually lead them to the check out areas after satisfying their needs. Satisfying their needs mainly consisted of recommending products that I like and know for a fact that works, making samples for the clients and/or even express check out using the mobile devise that is only for debit or credit cards.
I have learned a lot more things about make-up than I knew. For example, achieving a flawless foundation routine by simply incorporating a luminous primer from any brand and mixing it with your foundation of any kind, to get that fresh awaken dewy look.
Management was very friendly and approachable, I enjoyed being in their presence because they really cared about their cast members (employees) and what was going on with them. Most importantly, they stayed on top of your performance and made sure you were giving nothing but your best.
My co-workers (cast members) were extremely great! They were always open to my questions and always gave a positive response, as if they were eager to teach a "rookie" a
As a seasonal a couple months back, I was excited and aspired to learn as much as I could and grow within Sephora in the short amount of time I was employed there. It was a great learning experience to go through their training and do their best to always show passion and love for Sephora, their products, and exude that with our clients; I also learned a lot about myself that I never knew existed in me. I will give Sephora's training program huge credit for that, and I thank them for it. Respect for each other is one of the biggest alleged values in the company culture. Being a fellow cast member of the Sephora team, I was excited and passionate about expressing Sephora's essential values they taught us in our training. There were a couple of coworkers in leadership that made me feel welcomed; they were so nurturing, and I'm genuinely, deeply grateful for their particular, individual contributions and personal guidance to my ambitions and aspirations with my experience to work for Sephora. What a beautiful experience to meet so many fellow co-workers from all different walks of life! That's what I'll miss most about Sephora: the camaraderie with fellow cast members, and the teamwork that was evident in the work atmosphere. There was a time, however, where I got the impression from certain leadership members that didn't exude a particular value of Sephora's that they regularly remind us of, based on their nonverbal cues and certain ways of addressing us when we expressed our c
ProsGreat learning environment and growth opportunities, IF you survive within that company; bonuses
ConsOverhiring; not enough hours, so no benefits; communication of termination
A typical day at work starts with a "touch base" where management gives cast members a review of what the past day/week looked like and how cast members can improve their "love" score (stores and cast members are rated on a love score based on client reviews). Most of the day involved a few cast members being able to CMA's (customized make up applications) on clients, but otherwise it was the same retail you'd imagine- stocking shelves, cleaning areas, and helping clients. I learned many different techniques and how to use products in various ways of learning-- audio/visual/hands on. Sephora has the best educational system that I've seen thus far in retail, bringing in cosmetic and skincare gurus to teach cast members one-on-one on proper cosmetic etiquette. Our store was brand new and our management was recruited first hand, but It would have been nice to have a chance to apply for management in the beginning. All management was chosen prior to applications being accepted and therefore left no room for new management or applicants to show the team what they could bring to the table. The co-workers were fun to be around-- most very young (late teens, college part-timers) but there was a nice age range overall and a diverse group of cast members. I would say for the younger ones with little customer service experience, were a little less concerned with crucial aspects of customer service than the "veterans" and the things that could be improved didn't seem to be address
Prosstore manager was awesome, food available many times, great educational experience, fun work environment, diverse clientelle and cast members
Consstill retail, long hours that can go closing to opening back-to-back, tiring to be on feet all day, too much/not enough staff available at times
I worked at Sephora in Walnut Creek for over one and a half years.
I loved my clients and gave them impeccable customer care.
Unfortunatly I came into some rough patches with my ex-husband and had to take a leave of absence.
I had the most positive cli comments of everyone in that store (cli is a survey clients do online and rate you) and my performance never wavered no matter how my private life was treating me, My clients came first!
Unfortunately Sephora only cares about attendance and not the quality and integrity of an employee (cast member). This is quite a shame!
When I relocated to a different city, they would not transfer me, but the manager said she would give me rave reviews!
One of the assistant managers (Directors in charge) that has any class actually wrote a wonderful email on my behalf. That is how I got an interview in this new location.
I was on my way to the job interview at Sephora at my new location but was told by this new manager that she'd talked to the manager in W,C and was cancelling the interview indefinitely! The manager in W.C lied to me and never kept her promise of the "rave reviews" And I can only assume she slandered my name.
I was mortified, I could not believe this could happen.
I had talked to Human Resources at the Corporate office.
They took absolutely no responsibility for this unprofessional and damaging act!
My friends at W.C. Sephora are telling me that clients are coming in and asking for me. I thought I would be working at this new
Having to be micro managed by 8 managers is a bit overwhelming and defeating. Their "culture" doesn't exist anymore for their employees. Managers are unwilling to accommodate work/life balance. You are expected to have open availability, yet managers are consistently absent during the busiest times...weekends, during promotions. You have to ask over a headset, anytime you wish to use the bathroom. You are 'coached', scolded like a child, anytime you step out of your zone, or spend too long with client, or are not cleaning enough. These are often announced over the headset, or in front of clients or other employees. This is designed to humiliate you and shame you. You are not allowed to talk to other employees at all. Even if its about a new product or technique or even to rally a solution to a client concern. You will get scolded. The only great thing about working there is your fellow peers, which you're not allowed to talk to, and the gratis. Benefits are only available to full time employees. Employees are promised promotions and hours at hiring, yet , obviously, there are never enough hours to go around, except for managers. Most employees start as a cashier and are never given the opportunity to do more or expand their career, as promised at the interview. Huge turnover! At least 40 people a year. If they don't like you, you just don't get hours, which is subjective to their whims, and leads to others looking for other jobs that will provide a living wage. The work is h
What a strange job this was. I worked the beauty department for another retailer and when I left that job, I thought Sephora would be a good bridge back into beauty retail. My co-workers were clique-ish pieces of work, it's as if these ladies never seemed to have mentally left high school. Only about two or three cast members actually went out of their way to acknowledge the presence of and actually be friendly to most of the seasonal cast members. I love Sephora as a company and brand, the clientele for this company was awesome and what's better, really, than getting together with a client to talk about and try on foundation, swatch new palettes, teach techniques. Clients were enthusiastic and rarely hard to please, service wise, this was a rewarding experience unlike any other retail experience I've had before. My coworkers however could've dropped the better than thou attitude, you know, y'all work at the mall and this attitude has rubbed off on the brand reputation of unfriendly vulture like makeup artists. There's a reason why your clients come into the store intimidated, wearing full faces of make up: most of you have issues actually being nice or helpful to each other, much less your clients.
The hours were never great here but it is a mall job. My store however, reeked of favoritism, I saw another seasonal I was onboarded with (who, of course, was personally recruited by a manager from a competing retailer) be given 40 hours and overtime while two other girls and I
Prosfree products every now and then, clients are awesome
A typical day at work:
On a typical day, you punch in for your shift and the first thing you do is get a touch base with the group of employees who are due at the same time along with one of the managers. In the touch base, you find out about the business and metrics for the previous day, the goals for the present day, and finally, focuses for the company and the store. After you're all caught up, you are assigned a zone (depending on what section you work in) and you begin approaching and assisting clients. When it's a peak hour, you find yourself assisting multiple clients at one time in a way that doesn't overwhelm you or the clients. You are constantly moving about your zone and making sure things run smoothly. During off-peak hours, you have time to make sure the appearance of your zone is in order. Then, you can clean up, fill in products that may have been sold and prepare for the next rush. If there are any brands that are scheduled to support in your store, you may have the opportunity to train with that representative and gain lots of useful information about that particular brand and the products!
What I learned:
Sephora really taught me how to speak with softeners, listen carefully, and deliver a strong problem solving/results driven attitude when it came to both clients and my personal life outside of work.
Management:
Management will very depending on which location.
My coworkers:
My coworkers are fabulous and are always there to lend a helping h
ProsGreat gratis, great flexibility and understanding (schedule-wise)
I wanted to get into makeup artistry, that's why I applied for a seasonal position at Sephora. When I got hired, all I got was false hope that they would keep me after the holidays since day one. Now, I never applied to do recovery. I applied to be a cashier. Somehow I got hired as recovery and they withheld MAJOR key parts about the job from me, such as the fact that I'd only be working when the store was closed and would never be interacting with customers or actually learning literally anything throughout my stay there. My first shift was very late at night and I was extremely uncomfortable with the fact that I'd have to be driving home so late at night and so I asked my leads if I could have an earlier schedule because I did need a second job. Here's the thing, for seasonal recovery, the early hours are somewhere around 6am to 7am and only really last until noon. That's another thing my leader never told me. So imagine my surprise when I started getting scheduled for crack of dawn shifts. Eventually it became apparent to me that they were only scheduling me days when the rest of the staff didn't want to or couldn't open because I would get there and nighttime recovery had been there the night before and done everything I needed to do. I would spend all day by myself and anytime I tried to socialize with a cast member my leaders would be upset with me(even though they were all standing around talking to each other). The last straw for me was when they tried to schedule me
Amazing and unique approach to customer service with fantastic corporate culture
Sephora is dedicated to excelling, like no other, in customer service. In fact we call our customers "clients". A customer comes in and buys something. A client is someone you build a personal and ongoing relationship with - this is what we want @ Sephora.
Like no other cosmetics retailer, Sephora spends enormous amounts of time and money investing in education. We call ourselves "The Beauty Authority" and we back that up by ensuring that our staff have unexcelled product knowledge which is updated with constant training by our education staff as well as by all our brand representatives as well.
Sephora has a very clear and unparalleled corporate culture called "The Seven Values". They are the REASON I wanted to work for them. The values guide our every move, every aspect of how we relate to our clients and how we relate to each other. Passion for the Client, Teamwork, Innovation, Initiative, Respect for all ... are some examples. "Respect for ALL" is our over-riding value for every thing we do and who we are.
I am at the Canadian Headquarters store. We are expected to lead, innovate and pilot for the rest of the company. We are EXTREMELY busy, having doubled our sales figures in only 3 years. We have risen through the ranks, as a store, to the point where we now rank # 14 in the entire world for sales. We are very HIGH achievers.
Every day I meet with our clients and discuss their very individual needs and concerns. I listen acutely and ask carefully
ProsAs in the main body of my review. Client survey feedback, bonuses, feeling part of a highly accomplished team.
ConsExtremely LOUD music that quite often makes conversation and consultation extraordinarily difficult.
A corporation that is more concerned with making money than the well-being and happiness of it’s employees
Sephora as a company puts on a giant show for those on the outside looking in to appear as a “great place to work”. This is absolutely not the case. There is zero work life balance even though Sephora claims it as one of it’s “values”. Management and head office expects both part time and full time employees to dedicate all their time to the company and to drop everything to work for them. You are constantly given a hard time when you do try to request time off, and questioned if/when you call in sick for a shift. There is never enough people scheduled, so you are almost always doing the job of multiple employees and are overwhelmed on a regular basis. Instead of giving pay increases where they are certainly due, Sephora bribes employees with gratis (free product) and continues to underpay employees for the overwhelming amount of work they do. During situations like a pandemic, they continuously prove that making money is more important than the safety of their employees.
There is zero support from management when short staffed and/or when clients verbally abuse employees. Management continuously picks favourites to give hours to, time off to, and gratis to on a regular basis.
Policies never apply to all employees, management picks and chooses who the policies apply to instead of applying them to all employees as they should. Management conducts them selves in an incredibly unprofessional manor and regularly both entertain and partake in gossiping about other employees both
ProsGratis (free product), good benefits for full time employees, product knowledge/education, small travel opportunities
ConsNo work life balance, constant indirect comments from management instead of direct acknowledgement and conversation, favouritism from management, bribery with gratis instead of proper pay increases, doing multiple jobs/tasks outside of pay grade, constant short staffing, no opportunity for advancement, zero discipline of employees not following policy and/or breaking rules, constantly picking up the slack of employees not doing their job, zero management support
2.5 stars rounded up.
I've worked there for quite a while, and I was there for both the previous CEO and the new one.
Before, they were really focused on their core values which emphasized work-life balance, teamwork, and expertise.
Recently, they've been focused on just making numbers, disregarding the cast members' morale and happiness.
In summary:
- less gratis; at my location, you'd be lucky to get a couple pieces a week if you're not a lead or specialist/store director. Why aren't the cast members who are actually selling not getting the gratis? Greedy leads and specialists/store directors end up having fat gratis bins.
Also, people from head office post their gratis on social media, and they LITERALLY get huge boxes of gratis. Remember that the people on the bottom are the reason why you can keep having your job.
- integrity doesn't seem to be a thing anymore. Most of the management team has gotten to where they are by brown nosing and don't put in the time or the hard work. Lots of politics and miscommunication.
- lack of education. Before, with the old CEO, they had loads of master classes. Within the past year, barely 5 master classes. How is "expertise" supposed to be a core value when you don't train your cast? You can't replace education and skill honed through practice with OSQ and WECARE (acronyms for a system of steps you take in every consultation that Sephora thinks is a sure fire way of getting people to buy stuff)
- no ro
Prosevents (espeically from Benefit) brought some semblance of happiness and free lunch
Consno communication, no advancement, abysmal gratis, no humility from management or head office, low pay, no training
A typical work day for me includes clocking in, helping clients with makeup recommendations, processing transactions on till, and greeting clients.
Over my time at Sephora, I have learned a lot in terms of artistry. From moving to different worlds, I have seen different aspects of how a business is ran.
The workplace culture is not good at my Sephora location. The
management team constantly uses tactics of favouritism to run their store. In addition, there is a huge lack of support from management in day-to-day life at Sephora. Many days they would be spent in "meetings" (these were about weekly, and consist of talking badly about cast) where no leadership is available on the sales floor, and when we would need assistance, they would be visibly angry that we bothered them.
Recently, there has been a huge cut in hours at Sephora. Full-timers (non-salary) have had their shifts cut from 5 a week to 4 or sometimes 3, and part-timers are expected to be able to pay their bills off of 5-10 hours a week. People who have gotten second jobs to supplement their pay and make ends meet have been met with disapproval from management. Even though people's second jobs collaborate with Sephora's schedule and work around these hours, there was a lot of talk about "loyalty" within the company and management would use a lot of "we have invested in you and now you've done this"; by investing in you, they mean sending you to mandatory programs and classes that you need in order to work
Sephora has allowed me to express who I am in full capacity. They have invested in me and ignited my passions consistently. I have been with the company for almost 10 years now and I have grown both personally and professionally as a part of Sephora.
As far as what my day to day work looks like it has evolved over the years as I have navigated through in store advisor roles, entry level and senior leadership roles to FSC roles(Head office).
I now work remotely from home 90% of the time. I have learned how to adjust my leadership style to different personalities and skillsets. I have expanded my business acumen, presentation and technology skills. I have been pushed out of my comfort zone in a supportive way.
My managers have always been my biggest cheerleaders. I have always felt supported and confident in navigating through change and obstacles with them. Celebration has been a huge part of my Sephora journey as well as feedback and coaching. My managers always are sure to recognize my successes small or big and also in the moment share feedback and guidance on how to grow through learnings along the way.
Culture is the biggest part of why I love this company. I have worked for other companies where the values are displayed on posters but not lived by the company. The values Sephora has are truly engraved into everything that they do, down to the way they treat there people and the business decisions that they have made. They also align with my personal values which is
Prospeople, culture, leadership, fun, growth
Consfast paced, change is constant
Questions And Answers about Sephora
What is the interview process like at Sephora?
Asked Jul 21, 2016
I applied one morning, about three hours later I was called in for a same day interview. The interview itself took about an hour, the mngr was pretty rude and honestly was a horrible experience. The mngr did contact me afterwards to offer me an interview with the GM that would result in actually getting the job, but after having the experience with the mngr I no longer wanted to proceed with the job.
Answered May 22, 2019
Got an email for an interview & went in the following day. It was a group interview. A couple days later I got a call for a second interview that same day, went in for a one-on-one. A week went by & they called both of my references & I just submitted my background check just waiting for it to be cleared! So it was about a 2 week process.
Answered Mar 27, 2019
What is the best part of working at Sephora?
Asked Nov 30, 2019
Free products, 30% off discount, and the travel opportunities.
Answered Aug 31, 2021
The 20% discount
Answered Nov 28, 2020
Why did you leave your job at Sephora?
Asked Mar 22, 2017
No advancement in positions.
Answered Aug 18, 2021
I left because of unprofessional psychopaths for managers.
Answered Jun 20, 2021
Does Sephora offer commission for sales on top of their hourly pay?
Asked Jun 26, 2016
No, but if the team makes their goal for the month you get a bonus. The pay is already pretty good compared to other retail type places. At SiJCP you also get 2$ per card application, which can stack up quick if you’re good at it, and considering that hundreds of people come in daily, it’s pretty easy. On top of that, you get extra little bonuses once you get to a certain amount of credit applications. Everybody else on here is just bitter. For the most part, if you do your job well, you’ll get paid well.
Answered Jan 28, 2020
Sephora employees do not get commission
Answered Jun 19, 2018
Would part-time hours be flexible if I am a full-time college student?
Asked May 19, 2017
Yes not a problem
Answered Jan 31, 2018
I think if you have a good manager they will work with you on and awesome schedule.