Great culture but I can’t pay my bills with good vibes
Pros
The culture is great and store level management has our backs. Interesting work and lots to learn.
Cons
- compensation is not fair for scope of work. At $17/hour, you’re doing not only general retail tasks, but administrative work for appointments and for optometrists, dealing with insurance and billing, troubleshooting vision issues, fitting glasses, pre-testing patients. We are selling medical devices after all, but the issue with all of these modern optical stores is they spin it more as a retail role where you’re really doing the work of a dispensing optician. - for this reason, I feel we are greatly taken advantage of as “eyewear stylists”. In Vancouver, the living wage has been reported as almost $21/hr, and this is a figure from 2018 - can imagine this has jumped quite a bit with inflation. BN has a “learn to earn” program where you get a $1 raise every 6 months of employment, up to 18 months. Meaning, it would take me a year and a half in this role to still make below a living wage. Yes, there’s bonuses (if you reach goal only) and okay benefits, but this is not enough. - the training is not enough. Considering how much there is to learn not only about optical but also software etc, there should be much more thorough training before being dropped into the deep end. - overall just feel taken advantage of. Pay is unfair and although the work environment and culture is great, I can’t pay my rent with good vibes.