Pros
The group that I worked with were really inspiring to be around. They were very dedicated to their roles and really welcomed me in. It was not a high volume store and was definitely a much slower store than my last location however the team really made the most of every day which made all the difference for me. I've made great friends through this experience.
Cons
Shinola is expanding too quickly for its own good. It is so unorganized that our team was completely left to fend for itself. HR did the best it could but without the support of corporate leads it was pretty much a struggle to work there daily. They didn't research the city codes or state laws in terms of proper overtime payment. The lead merchandiser had no concept of employee safety when it came to merchandising the store. No matter how many times we tried to get support it fell on deaf ears. When the corporate team did eventually come to do a store visit they didn't speak about anything business related. There was no walk thru there was no talk of how the business was doing; I only talked about the weather with them. It was pretty complexing as to what they were even there for other than to approve paying our parking tickets because they couldn't figure out how to get us permits to park in the city for over two hours in one spot. We literally had to leave the store to move our car every two hours. It was unbelievable. I stayed there for the short time that I did because my SD was amazing. She did an amazing job at keeping the store afloat despite the lack of help from the corporate level. Eventually the entire store quit after a visit from the founder who was not only rude but ended up firing one team member out of the four working there because she wasn't "on brand". It was a disgusting misuse of power and the team finally felt that it was no longer a positive environment and that the company really was not all about "bringing jobs back to America"; but about an image. Retail is a materialistic world but working for this company was supposed to be about connecting with people and sharing this great brand when in reality it all felt like a big sham after meeting the people behind the company.