truck driver

shift manager

retail sales associate

manager in training

delivery driver

AutoZone

What is the best part of working at the company?
I suppose you get a paycheck every two weeks?

What is the most stressful part about working at the company?
Working for AutoZone has been an incredibly frustrating and disheartening experience. I feel like the company takes advantage of its employees, including myself, by overloading us with work and providing inadequate compensation and support. The workload is simply overwhelming, and it seems like they prioritize cutting costs over ensuring a reasonable work-life balance for their workers.

The pay and benefits they offer are far from satisfactory. Despite putting in my best effort and dedication, the compensation doesn't reflect the value of the work I do. The benefits package is lacking, leaving me and my colleagues without essential support for our well-being.

Moreover, the work culture at AutoZone is disappointing. It often feels like favoritism reigns, leaving many of us feeling undervalued and unsupported by management. Opportunities for growth and advancement are scarce, making it difficult to see a future with the company.

The scheduling practices at AutoZone are incredibly disruptive. The overtime shifts(pretty much mandatory) make it challenging to plan personal commitments and have a healthy work-life balance. It feels like they don't respect our time and the need for stability in our lives.

Training and safety are also lacking. The company's approach to training is insufficient, leaving us ill-prepared for the challenges we face on the job. Furthermore, the lack of proper safety measures puts us at unnecessary risk, and it's clear that our well-being is not a top priority.

In conclusion, working for AutoZone has been a frustrating and exploitative experience. The overwhelming workload, inadequate compensation and benefits, lack of support, and disruptive scheduling practices leave many of us feeling undervalued and disheartened. It's time for AutoZone to prioritize the well-being of its employees and create a more supportive and equitable work environment.






What is the work environment and culture like at the company?
The work environment at the company can vary based on specific locations and management styles, but there are some common observations reported by employees. Generally, the work environment at AutoZone can be described as fast-paced and demanding. There is often a sense of urgency in completing tasks and serving customers, which can lead to a high-stress atmosphere.

As mentioned earlier, the work culture may also be characterized by favoritism, where some employees feel that certain individuals receive preferential treatment from management. This perception can create a sense of unfairness and negatively impact team dynamics.

Moreover, the lack of adequate staffing can contribute to an overwhelming workload, leading to employees feeling overworked and underappreciated. The pressure to keep up with demands and deliver excellent customer service can add to the stress levels experienced by the staff.

On the positive side, some employees may enjoy working with the diverse range of automotive products and interacting with customers who share their passion for cars. Additionally, coworkers who are supportive and collaborative can create a more positive and enjoyable work environment.

Overall, the work environment at AutoZone can be a mix of high-pressure situations, strained work-life balance due to irregular scheduling, and concerns about compensation and career advancement. It's essential to note that individual experiences may vary, and the work environment can be influenced by factors such as store location, management team, and fellow coworkers.

What is a typical day like for you at the company?
You know the "Everything is fine" meme? It's pretty much everybody doing that all day. From corporate on down to the lowliest employee.

The store managers and my fellow employees were some of the nicest, most helpful people I've ever had the pleasure of working with, and the customers were less consistently unbearable than the ones I encountered working at a supermarket. The average work day was effectively painless, and the workload remained more or less consistent throughout the day--the first hour after opening and first before closing were usually pretty dead, but beyond that, the store was pretty lively. All in all, the work itself was actually pretty good, for what it was.

Unfortunately, that's about as positive as I'm willing to be about it. While store management was full of good, decent, skillful men and women, there was clearly no real communication between people at the store level and our corporate overlords. Management frequently complained about being asked to cut hours to the degree that they wouldn't even have enough people to operate the store, the employee policies seemed to change on a monthly basis, and we were actively discouraged from unionizing, which left us completely powerless to change anything. The sickness policy was positively Dickensian--every scheduled day of work you missed, regardless of the reason you had for missing, you got a point. Six points, you got a warning. Nine points, another warning. Twelve points, fired. Such a concept isn't entirely odious on its face, but from what I could find in the employee handbook and various online resources, those points never expired. The longer you work for Autozone, the more likely it is that they'll fire you purely by virtue of having taken a total of twelve sick days over your entire career with them.

Payment was another headache--paychecks only came every two weeks, and I use the term very loosely. Instead of getting an actual check, we had so-called "pay cards" that were essentially employer-issued debit cards. Worse still, the bank the cards was associated with had no presence in the Cincinnati metropolitan area whatsoever, and no businesses accepted it as a legal-tender debit card, so the only means of actually getting your money was to pay a fee at your own bank to have the money transferred from your employee account at God-Knows-Wherever Bank to your personal account at a local bank. You had to pay out-of-pocket just to get paid. The fact that such a setup is becoming increasingly common in this country does nothing to detract from the sheer ludicrousness of it.

Autozone is a complicated beast; while, on its surface, it feels like the company truly cares and wants you and your fellow employees to succeed, under the surface, they're doing nothing to help you and several things that actually hold you back. Day-to-day, it's not really that big a deal, but the little frustrations that arise from how top-heavy the organizational structure is will start to take their toll the longer you stick around. Autozone's turnover for store employees is incredibly high, and there's a good reason for that: the best people in the entire organization are clustered around the bottom of the ladder.

I worked at a hub store - not as big as a mega hub but overall a big store that is pretty busy even in the Winter and this pandemic.

>a typical day at work
>>Depends on whether it’s a truck day or not.
>>On a truck day depending on how many pallets are delivered it could take up a good chunk of the day to put up inventory. Depending on how good you are with customers you maybe called back to help if there are too many customers. Putting up truck isn’t hard but somethings like rack and pinions, brake rotors/shoes, crankshafts, etc. are heavy or they can be in awkward spots.
>>On a non-truck day you’ll be at the front desk helping any customers that comes in, doing inventory, replacing bulbs, replacing batteries cleaning, and front facing. As of writing Autumn has recently begun so things will start to slow down, when Winter begins that is when things will come to a screeching halt so be ready to stand for hours doing nothing.
>what you learned
>>If there is anything I’ve learned it is cooperation, it goes without saying but if you’re having an issue or need help just ask, if inventory if off or you see a suspicious character let management know, if management ask you to do something that you are fully capable of doing and the task isn’t weird just do it don’t make a ruckus.
>Management
>>There’s two type of managers I’ve seen when I was working, hands on and hands off. What do I mean by this? Well earlier when I mentioned things you’ll do on a normal truck and non-truck days these are things management can do too, but due to the importance of managers they’ll mostly be seen at the front desk with customers but most can do stuff like inventory or cleaning. The hands-on managers are as you can imagine much more pleasant to work with because it feels like you’re in the same boat, of course it is the opposite when the managers are hands-off they’ll stand there and bark orders, rather unpleasant individuals.
>workplace culture
>>I would describe my workplace as carefree but can be serious when the it needs to be. I didn’t get many opportunities to talk to my coworkers but believe me I loved being in their presence, work is a lot less stressful/boring when you have a color cast of characters that has your back. One thing that does bother me is that a few is the push for checkout challenges and stuff like that, from my perspective they don’t matter much so I rarely if ever sold them.
>the hardest part of the job
>>Customers, I would get out of bed dreading that I have to interact with customers. Most are not unpleasant, most are rather nice actually but all it takes is a one guy to ruin your entire day, and let me tell you, you will encounter at least one a week. 
>the most enjoyable part of the job
>>Coworkers, even though AutoZone has a high turnover rate I have met plenty of nice people while working sometimes it sucks to see them go, I mean I feel bad for leaving because there is a good chance I wont see most if not all of them ever again. If we were working in a different environment like warehouse or what I’m doing now it would be even more hard for me to.
Many people work at AutoZone for many reasons they need a job, want to stay preoccupied, etc. In that sense AutoZone is good place to work. Also not to mention AutoZone employees get a lot of discounts from various companies that should be taken advantage of. Overall my feelings are mixed yet I wouldn’t work at AutoZone again if given the choice. 



I worked as a sales Manager and had to delegate tasks to the sales associates. 

I did both opening & closing which means I opened and closed the store. Tasks needed for that was making sure the store was clean, cashiering, and checking we had our products.

The good:
We get a lot of perks working with AZ such a discount from big name companies and car parts. 
-I learned A LOT about cars which is extremely helpful now when looking into buying my own cars or helping family members.

-I love the fact that we could quickly go to the store to get a snack.

-When customers were wrong, my managers ALWAYS sided with us and was not afraid to defend us.

-Most times, customers are actually quite nice and appreciated our help.

On Workplace culture
-Toxic, it was all about how much sales we could do, upselling EVERYTHING, picking up shifts even we didn't want to and NEVER missing work.  There was a time when EVERYONE in my store got C**ID, instead of my managers and our higher ups trying to get other people from other stores to cover, I was pretty much forced to work even though I didn't feel well myself.

Another time, there was a family emergency I had and I was also feeling poorly, my store manager completely went off on me for missing work even though I had already cleared that I would not be available and had never taken a day off. They threatened me, insulted me, it was a mess.

On the store culture being toxic as well, in one of my store, one of my store manager literally put their hands on me and shook me because they thought I wasn't selling enough of our product and was "Lowering our score within the company."

With that same store, when I got my CO*ID vaccines, I had warned my store manager that I would not be able to work from those days due to the effect. I was forced to still go and it wasn't until I passed out that they let me go home...which I had to go, walk and take a bus b/c they couldn't even call a cab for me.

I could go on but I won't.

I still get panic attack even after leaving that job due to what it did to me.

When it comes to schedules:
If you are a sales associates, if you are favored by the store manager who is in charge of making the schedule, you'll get a lot of hours, if you aren't favored, you'll be lucky to do a 4 hour shift for the whole week. 

As a sales manager, which is what I was, it felt like I was the store manager, what annoyed me the most is that the majority of my time was forced to be spend cashiering, just being at the register which to me had NOTHING to do with management. 

On store locations: 
Depending where you are, it varies. Where I lived, I was send first to their most dangerous store location, I am talking about stealing, gangs, ect. In the other stores I worked at, a big thing was people coming to steal products. If you are super lucky, you'll have security, if not...good luck.

Overall:
Don't take the job, just don't do it unless you want to end up with panic attack, management insulting you and telling you to upsale EVERYHING, we call it WITTDR "Whatever it takes to get the job done right." So if someone comes to buy a car light, we are expected to sell them also the lube that goes with it which is 1-2$ more, ect.

Search somewhere else, don't get this job. Again, customers a lot of the time were wonderful, I made beautiful friendships with the mechanics that used to buy stuff from us...but the management was just horrid and I am not talking about just store manager, but also district managers and even higher. 




I worked for AutoZone around the 2010's. At the time, I had a wonderful work experience. I was able to be promoted to a PSM in about six months and I enjoyed my job. I felt like I worked with a great crew and my store manager was wonderful. I left the company, life happened, and I needed a job and thought I would try there again because I enjoyed it so much before. 

Today, AutoZone is a very different company. Upper management complains about struggling to hire but doesn't offer competitive wages and terrible benefits. The people they do hire, as a result, are not the best employees. I truly felt like upper management did not care about their employees AND customers, at all. They are so focus on pushing grease packets and fuel injector cleaner instead of focusing on raising wages to attract good, talented employees. The moral is low and basically, if you just show up to work, you can't lose your job. I worked with the most incompetent, lazy, clueless people. Employees did not want to leave the counter and I watched a fellow manager stay in the same spot for nearly his whole shift. So many times I heard my fellow coworkers AND store manager refuse to assist customers with simple things like loosening a tight oil cap for someone with low oil who needed to add some, and I can't count how many times my store manager said "I don't know" when I asked a question, or say "we can't help them" and offer no other problem solving solutions. 

Being a former employee, I knew how to do most duties of my job and within 2 days, tasks were being dumped on me because I was competent. Why is it that we are relying on a a fair few employees to complete tasks instead of training everyone? One of my coworkers, another manger, didn't know how, or was too lazy to do, something as simple as a planogram. So, the planograms sat in the system overdue. Inexcusable. Huge puddles of water in the entry way when I came in one morning after a thunderstorm the night before that no one bothered to mop up, a huge slip hazard. Instead, they hastily slapped a "wet floor" sign on the floor instead. I knew that with the humidity we had, that amount of water would take longer than a day to dry. My coworkers who were there before me didn't care to clean it up so I immediately grabbed a mop. I knew that if I stayed, a ton of things would be dumped on me, as they already were. I would be pulling the weight of several people and I wasn't paid nearly enough to put up with that. 

My schedule was awful, working longer than 8 hour shifts consistently. One of my schedules had me working seven days straight before getting a day off.  If you are a parent, this is not a good fit for you. The way they schedule, you are often alone with a red shirt, a regular sales associate, and if something happened, you cannot leave the store without shutting it down. There has to be at least two people there, and if they're short staffed, it's just two people. Getting time off is impossible if they're short staffed as well. Scheduling doctors appointments isn't easy because the schedule isn't done that far in advanced. If you're full time you HAVE to have open availability. 

The job itself would be okay you weren’t  payed barely minimum wage for your hard learned car knowledge. Raises are 50 cents each year and refuse to give you more. They purposefully understaff themselves and due to many reasons the scheduling is all over the place, you’ll have to really convince your manager to put you in certain days and times, only then will the job be flexible. Redshirt workers are tasked with stocking, store cleaning, sales, phone call customer service, and battery replacement. All while running around like a headless chicken. there’s no benefits working part time other than 20% discount, full time gets benefits but the hours aren’t even 40 most the time. Unless you know a lot about car maintenance, you’ll have a lot of difficulty here. The training covers car parts, handling, functionality, even safety. But the training doesn’t cover most items sold in the shelves and how they are used, nor does it cover car makes and models and their common needs. You’ll find yourself frequently asking your coworkers for help or for things you need more information on. More often than not its on a busy day, and they wont be able to help you due to the store being busy, the customer will have to wait, delaying busy lines. You’ll have to learn most information on your own or from experience if the training didn’t cover it. If you’re lucky you will have coworkers at the cash register while you’ll mainly do truck and stocking. Or when you cover a night shift where the store kinda dies down.

This is a given at any job, but customers here can be a problem. There are too many instances where customers will either be stuck in the parking lot, or come back a few days later, and will try to blame something on you if there’s something wrong with their car after you installed or recommend a product, most commonly it’s after a battery change. Really depends on the make and model if you want to recommend a part from autozone. Unfortunately the customer expects you to know that. You have to constantly reassure them you’re not a mechanic and that you don’t know a lot about something.

Lastly I’ll write a few tips I learned while on the job if you do end up deciding to work sales here. When you’re doing a battery change, don’t let the customer turn off their car, always run the alternator test first while the car is running before changing the battery. It’s common for the customer to have a bad alternator or starter and will save them a jump start. Don’t do anything you’re not qualified for, even if the customer will tip you, just send them to a mechanic (you’re not allowed to accept tips by the way). If you have difficulty replacing the battery, especially while unscrewing j-hooks don’t force it, it’ll most likely snap especially with corrosion around the screw. Also be aware of which car you decide to work on sometimes it’ll take 45 minutes, or reprogrammed, the computer will tell you this.

This just a minimum wage side job if you’re into cars, for career opportunities do yourself a favor and just find a different job, you’re better off doing an apprenticeship at a mechanic if you want to really work on cars, or any other job for that matter. the pay and raise isn’t worth it and not sustainable to live off of.

I work in the Bakersfield ca area and im currently a part sales manager im extremely good at what i do butbthe company/management doesnt care they see your performance and then they expect more out of you, even tho i would upsell like crazy i could never ask for a raise because they wanted me to push everyone else as a store so i could get that raise, with all honesty ima tell you guys like it is, managers are underpaid and over worked, your entitled to 2 breaks in a 8 hour shift but other people get upset over you taking your break the yearly raises are 15 cents to like 30 cents, if someone calls out it hurts the whole store and your gonna suffer, you build up sick time but if you call out for being sick you start bumping heads with people so you probably wont end up using it and they wont pay you for it if you leave, it doesnt matter what you do the customer is always right over your opinion, as a manager your just a person with a password you dont even get to make decisions cause you can easliy get written up, people at autozone dont get tested unless you have an accident you know what that means lets just say many people could loose there job, you dont get 40 hours a week youll end up getting 36-38 if your full time, overtime is rare and you can get in trouble if you go over, the only two people at autozone making ok money is the commercial manager and the store manager thats it youll just be there backup with less pay. Vacation time is once a year for 1-2 weeks and its called paid time off, insurance sucks cause your already getting low money, customers will put you down and make you feel dumb and the company doesn’t care even if your a manager. Ive seen people defend them selves from an attack and loose there job, depending on the location where you work it can be dangerous a couple stores have been robbed at gun point and so have the warehouse delivery drivers. Honestly the only good thing about working here is working with car parts and discounts if you happen to work on cars sometimes the people you meet and some co workers. As a regular employee part time you can expect around 20 hours or less. If the store doesnt meet daily goals they cut your hours, if your a driver your expected to drive fast and get to your destination quickly but obey the rules of the road at the same time and when you get into a car accident or your gps starts beeping for violations your spoke to about it even tho they pressure you to drive fast. I have no reason to lie and i have nothing against the company although they carry themselves this way well thats how they’ve became successful so far so with that being said this is what ive experienced working here im a manager and im currently looking for something else this is the worst job ive had so far, i stayed because i wanted the manager experience for my resume but its not worth it poeple youll be underpaid and overworked theres people working here for years making minimum wage or 1$ more good luck but feel free to try it out 🙂

There is constant pressure from the Store Managers who are corporate suck-ups to upsell customers on parts that they may/may not need. The few good Store Managers only care about things that actually matter, such as punctuality, knowledge, work ethic, reliability, customer service, etc.

There is huge pressure from district and regional managers to get the base level employees at their stores to upsell customers, and call their stores daily if customers are not buying enough promoted items, but the employees on whom this pressure is placed do not have any incentives to upsell other than to suck-up to corporate to move up the ladder. Employees are "rewarded" with pins like they're in the Boy Scouts if they accomplish good sales, upsells, etc. without monetary compensation/reward.

Employees are expected to be able to give car repair advice and diagnose vehicle issues like mechanics, but be payed minimum or slightly above minimum wage. Employees are chewed out by management if they work any overtime at all, i.e. clocking in 5 minutes early/late.

Typical pay for managers (not base level employees) is from $11-$14/hr.
Store Managers are expected to work 50 hr./week minimum (usually more like 70 hr./week) for $35-45K yearly salary with no overtime pay.

Lunch breaks are constantly interrupted because front desk employees get overwhelmed by customers. This is because stores are constantly understaffed due to corporate not approving payment for adequate staffing.

Employees must provide their own uniforms and are expected to never sit down their entire shift, regardless of how slow business may be or how long they have worked.

The yearly "Holiday Party" is basically budgeted around $100/store, which is just enough to maybe get enough pizza for everyone to have a few slices at an event all employees are required to attend at night, after hours, in uniform.

All employees have to attend periodic team meetings before/after hours, in uniform, during which they hear their store sales numbers and other data about which none of them care, and they are all required to start every meeting with the "Autozone Cheer" which consists of grown men and women being forced to act like high school cheerleaders and form their bodies into letters spelling out "A-U-T-O-Z-O-N-E" while shouting out the letters, then shouting a mantra praising Autozone's pricing and customer service, ending with a loud "Wooh!" and a fist pump. I swear I am not making any of this up.

A typical day at AutoZone consists of clocking in and either working on returns (parts that customers from other AutoZones ordered and ended up not wanting that are returned back to us with a transfer paper that needs to be checked and put back into the system), picking for customers and satellite stores, working on truck from the distribution center, or loading your van to deliver parts to satellite stores. You work at a fast and steady rate consistently through your entire shift with an hour lunch that is not paid. There are several managers in the store: three managers in the hub that consists of one hub coordinator, a mid-shift manager, and a closing manager; in the front part of the hub (store) also has three managers: an opening manager, mid-shift manager, and closing manager. There is also a store manager and a commercial manager. Several co-workers that I work with don't even do their jobs correct most of the time meaning that some co-workers mostly stand around, put parts lazily in the wrong place, or will only do one part of their job and nothing else. The other co-workers that I work with do their job effectively. This is the hardest part of the job. A lot of co-workers that I work with don't do their job, just do their job lazily, or call out several times which makes it harder for everyone else to do their job. AutoZone has a point system, and because we are the hub, the store manager is lenient on everyone which makes it very hard on everyone. Another part that makes the job difficult are the conflicting managers in the store, mainly the hub coordinator. The hub coordinator believes that he is the only one that can do the job right and tells everyone, including other managers even though they are all on the same level, what to do. This cause huge conflicts. AutoZone's district manager does nothing to fix this problem. Also, the hub coordinator, despite several attempts from the store manager, does not get the schedule out in time. He follows AutoZone's policy of "it's at the managers discretion". With that being said, the hub coordinator feels it is okay to put out the schedule for the new week at the start of the new week and then gets angry when people are late. The late of an early schedule provides difficulty in planning personal time on days you have off for the new week. This makes it hard to do things, like schedule a doctors appointment. Another hard part of the job is how much they pay their employees that work in the hub. Working in the hub means you work in a small warehouse, lift parts that weigh between 1 and 100 pounds, and putting away truck that gets delivered everyday. Everyone complains about the pay because of how much is actually being done; its like a warehouse. The enjoyable part about the job is helping the customers.

I told them when I was interviewed that I would need certain days off because I would be returning to school. They "encouraged" me going back to school, and assured me that this would not be a problem. Yet, ever since the first day I worked there, the schedules came out usually 1-2 days prior to the work week, you never had the same hours/days(week to week), and even after the "final" schedules were posted, 80% of the time there were changes made to your schedule(even to the day of working/usually the day before). How are you supposed to make any sort of plans with scheduling like that? I couldn't make plans to visit my dying grandmother, let alone schedule classes to go back to school( even with a full two weeks notice) This is the main reason i eventually quit. Although, there were others that, when combined with scheduling, led to my quitting. I learned nothing while working there, except part numbers and how to TRY not to get hurt on the job. There was almost no real training involved before throwing you into the job and wondering why you didn't perform well. I actually had to ask for more training, because there were so many things that I needed to know to do my job that absolutely were not gone over, at all. The management was ridiculous! haha Supposedly started his career @ AZ doing my specific job, yet couldn't answer a single helpful question for me to save his life. Never left the office(could have contributed to him pushing 400 lbs) but you can't manage a a retail store if you can't physically see what is going on @ the registers, on the sales floor, in the warehouse. Atleast, every once in awhile??? C'mon! :) My co-workers were OK. In the same boat as me, I guess. Probably the best thing about the job, if I HAD to choose one. But, they stole and overcharged/didn't ring up customers all the time. (maybe cuz nobody(Manager) was watching?) The hardest part of the job was staying as long as I did. Seriously! And the warehouse(where I worked most of my time) was such a mess (unsafely stored heavy parts on 30ft shelves falling all the time. It is common corporate and store procedure to place the heaviest parts we stocked, on the very highest point of their rickety shelving. I asked many times how/why that was a rule/good idea with no real answer except "that's how it's done"). I am surprised I left with as few injuries as I did. I am still missing half my big toe nail, from a brake rotor falling out of it's box. Great job if you're looking for a good Worker's Comp. case. ;p And the most enjoyable part of the job was the end of the day/day off/quitting! Good luck, if you still decide to check it out. And be very careful/watch your back!

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Truck driver 208 salaries reported	$1,822 per week
Shift manager 231 salaries reported	$14.63 per hour
Retail sales associate 98 salaries reported	$11.43 per hour
Manager in training 82 salaries reported	$19.40 per hour
Delivery driver 74 salaries reported	$12.06 per hour

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