manager

store manager

sales associate

assistant manager

retail assistant manager

Claires

Claire's seems to be stuck in the early 2000's with everything. From their software to how they do their paperwork, things are just not up to date. I went to Claire's to be an assistant store manager and was very excited about the opportunity. I will say my experience was clouded by a truly crazy manager who forced us to lie to customers about ear piercing and returns. She made us straight up say we did not except returns and had us hide the little sign on our counter that said we did. If someone made a huge fuss we would take their return only to be reprimanded by store manager for doing so. 

She told us to lie to potential ear piercing customers to tell them we could not do the cheaper type studs like the stainless, etc. She wanted the diamonds or the most expensive and that was that. We were in a dying mall and she figured we would make more money that way. Unfortunately people would ask all the time why the other types of studs were on display if we "couldn't do those" and we would have to make something up on the spot. It was a horrible thing to have to do. We alienated customers who could see right through the lie and would leave without ear piercing and without shopping at all. 

Now if you took away our manager the job wasn't as bad, but still was not good. I had come from a larger retailer as a supervisor hoping to gain management experience. I was nothing but a glorified key holder here. Their truly was not anything I did that the teenage girls working for me didn't do besides getting yelled at more for our dismal sales.  I was so disappointed to be taking such a huge step back in responsibility and duties. 

Day to day consisted of checking emails on Claire's ancient computer system. The DM would usually belittle us for terrible sales (again we were in a dead mall with four stores left) and give us impossible to reach sales goals for the say. You would normally work your entire shift except for maybe a half hour if you were lucky with a coworker. Next you would spend time changing out signs for the 9000 time that week. I am not exaggerating, Claire's had a stockpile of cheesy signs that you continually had to change all over the store all the time. It was pointless and time consuming. 

Also pointless and time consuming were the near constant store resets. We would take the same boring merchandise we had for months, some items YEARS, and simply move it around. Apparently we would magically sell more tired merchandise by completely changing around the store setup every several days. The few customers we had would routinely comment about how annoying it was that they never knew where to look for what they wanted because it was always moved around...and they were right. I get resetting a store to make it fresh. However when we rarely got anything new or different, it just didn't work. 

While trying to reset the entire store and change signage by yourself you would also get stock. This would come in several large boxes with each.item.indiviually.wrapped.  I wish I was kidding but truly, down to each right or pair of earrings, it was all individually wrapped. There was no rhyme or reason to what items came with which shipment. Everything was just thrown together. Often times this would be more of the stale stuff you already had that wasn't selling, which made no sense. 

So at any given time you would be resetting store, changing sings, and attempting to put away and backstock merchandise while hoping that you could convince a Mom to let you pierce her terrified, screaming 5 year old's ears with our "diamond" studs. 

As far as the ear piercing training that Claire's seems so proud of, it consists of flat cardboard ears with a thin piece of foam backing and a giant binder of what I assume is piercing info. My manager had me "practice" on the cardboard ears for about five minutes and informed me I would be doing the next one that came in. She had me flip through the binder and sign something saying I read it. I was told I would learn all I needed to learn through experience. I was not comfortable with this "training" to say the least but had to go for it. 

At Claire's my piercing customers came from all walks of life and ages. I had tiny infants all the way to elderly customers in their 90's. There were some fun times where the child or adult was very excited about the piercing, that was great to be a part of. But for every one of those types there were three times as many children who were terrified and did not want to be there. We had to pierce children being held down by three people, please believe me that this is not an understatement. I felt horrible doing this and wanted to say no but I knew I would lose my job if I did so. 

The gun that we used was nothing different than what you can purchase at walmart or a beauty supply store. All we did was wipe ears with alcohol, try our darndest to make even dots with a wipe away marker, load the studs and shoot them in. There were many times that the cartridge with stud would get stuck and the back would not go on properly..things of that nature. Bottom line, you are not getting a professional piercing done at Claire's. 

The pay was low for an Assistant Manager but again there was very little responsibility in the position, at least at my store. All in all it was a very bad experience for me and I wish I had never taken the position. I want to add that the pay for keyholders is ridiculously low as well. We struggled to get anyone to work for us because these college girls could get paid way more at almost any retailer and not have to pierce ears on top of it!

My personal experience with the company Claire’s started out with high hopes of consistent as well as fair hours with decent pay, but I ended up learning some other valuable traits. Having a good SM as well as ASM will play a large variable in staying or leaving.

I shall start off with the responsibilities of a third key:
- You should be able to find, replenish if no more, and complete opening to closing paperwork.
- Surveys, e-mails, and selling diamonds as well as earrings in general is top priority.
- Be capable of completing towers, walls, and floor plans in the store.
- Overnight POG changes.
- Make sure go-backs are done in a timely manner, floor is vacuumed (depending on the store), checkout area is organized, etc.
- Making sure you are opening and closing in a timely manner.
- Check in and do shipment in addition to putting overstock away and organized properly.

Expect weekdays to go by slow yet fairly consistent when schools are on break. Weekends are busy, but thats when the store hits it’s peak for the week in sales goals. Through this job I have learned to be flexible with different people of different backgrounds. You can tell who is willing to put in the work and who is just there to occupy themself by show of effort. I now know how to pierce earlobes and cartilage with a gun, but will never repeat again. My first boss from while I was working there made the work environment fun, eventful, provided a motivating environment. She definitely showed us appreciation and even got us pizza from time to time. Unfortunately she is not at that current location anymore yet maybe that’s what’s best. The assistant manager who I had the pleasure of working with was always ready to show me something new, encouraged asking questions, and always showed us appreciation. They were both angels! The last manager I worked (manager who came after my first boss) offered nothing but ridicule about an employee to another employee while not even having much experience in managing a store. I felt as though I was the one answering questions for the current manager and getting things prepared for her when that was above my pay grade. The work environment went from manageable to chaotic and stressful. It was a shame to see the store slowly yet surely regress in effort and teamwork. My position had its pros and cons, but the hardest part of my job was not feeling appreciated. The store at the time was put in a difficult position in terms of being short staffed. The manager at that time was simply not appreciative enough to the employees who stayed and tried their best. After about a month or so I couldn’t stay any longer with the work environment that was taking place. Since some time has passed now, I could only hope that if the same manager is there that she refines her communication skills as well as appreciates her employees. Construction criticism is to help you and those around you.

The most enjoyable part of my job was meeting my previous manager as well as the assistant manager. I have also met some good coworkers as well as people who I should steer away from. It was all a learning experience, but a pleasant and progressive one above all.

When I first started at Claire’s, I was expecting the job to be fun. It was hyped up in the interview as a fun place to work! Maybe it is for very high energy, bubbly, outgoing people who don’t mind selling cheap stuff to people and being a pushy salesman, while constantly cleaning up after children. For me, though, I wasn’t happy. We struggled to keep sales numbers up because all of us were always stressed over the condition of the store, constant theft, sales signs all over changing almost daily, needing to send photos to an app for the DM to see that we did the sales signs correctly, where the sales are at every 3 hours, plan to boost sales the rest of the day, how man year piercings and the plan to reach the goal, constant communications from home office about moving things around, product placement, sale changes, sign change (3-5 days a week), we spent so much time checking email, changing the store and dealing with crying children getting their ears pierced against their will that we didn’t have time to focus on just “having fun” and selling to people.
As a store manager, alone in the store most of the time, it’s a task to balance keeping up on doing schedules, planning sales goals for the day/week/quarter/year (with adjustments based on how the previous day/week/month/quarter and year did); adjustments every 3 hours based on how the day is doing; ear piercings goals and adjustments by the hour/day/week/month/quarter/year.
If you have a team of people who aren’t naturally pushy, and I’m not, then you’re going to be constantly coaching and planning goals. This is on top of the said sign changes, stores rearranging, shipments, numbers updates every 3 hours, doing schedules in a 1980 register system that malfunctions, checking emails for company communications about changes 3 times a day, people calling out because it’s a part-time job, stopping everything for an ear piercing while you’re alone and others are stealing from your store or making a mess... I had a small store with stained and ripping carpet. It always looked awful and it asked for zero respect from customers and employees.
I was stressed all the time.
On my days off my DM usually had to text me about something an employee wasn’t doing because they missed a last minute email. 
The company was too demanding and constantly trying way to hard to boost sales.
It’s all about sales. 
Yes, every company is, but they change sales and signs almost daily. We always had to tie a plan on how we were going to meet the goals for the day. Mid-day, if we weren’t at a certain point with sales, we had to explain why and what we were going to do to fix that. That’s too much on smaller stores with one employee on at a time.
There was always something coming up that was top priority that made me rearrange my days and fall behind on my manager tasks. 
I worked overtime weekly, went in on days off and worked from my phone or computer for free all the time. If I was going into overtime due to working on a day off, or covering someone’s shift, I had to cut my hours elsewhere and fine last minute coverage. It was stressing out my employees.
It was an awful experience. 
Also, piercing guns should not pierce cartilage. Period.

I worked at Claire’s for over a year. In the beginning, it was amazing. I loved the job, I loved the customers, and I thought I had finally found a place where I could grow. But that hope shattered the moment my first manager quit. After her, the last three managers all quit without notice, leaving everything on me. Each time it happened, the weight fell on my shoulders, and nobody from the company seemed to care about the stress it caused.

The second-to-last manager before I quit was extremely difficult. She emotionally and mentally undermined me, leaving me feeling trapped and powerless. Most days were overwhelming, but I stayed because Claire’s was one of the few jobs available in Cedar Falls. I felt vulnerable, afraid, and stuck in a cycle I couldn’t escape.

And it wasn’t just the people—the store itself was unsafe. Exposed wires and hazardous conditions were a regular part of the environment. When I reported these issues, nothing was done, and I was often treated as if I were the problem. District leaders rarely offered support—they came only to criticize, nitpick, and tell me everything I was doing wrong. I was never properly trained or assisted.

I was passed up for promotion repeatedly, even though I was essentially running the store. The only reason I became Assistant Manager was because the previous manager quit without notice. Even then, it wasn’t because my work was recognized—it was to prevent me from leaving when I expressed that I could no longer work extreme hours. That “promotion” was a stopgap measure, not a reward for hard work.

Claire’s never supported or valued me. During my time there, I was overworked, underpaid, and constantly pressured to cover shifts I couldn’t manage. Once, I was almost disciplined for old scars on my arm. When I reported concerns, my safety and wellbeing were ignored.

Then came the bankruptcy announcement. I felt hollow, like all the effort I had poured into that store was wasted. Out of despair, I quit, thinking the store was closing for good. Not even three hours later, they announced it wasn’t. When I asked for my job back, I received no response—they simply ignored me.

That’s the truth about Claire’s. They are a company that prioritizes profit over people. They exploit employees, ignore unsafe conditions, and leave staff feeling disposable. I spent almost every shift uncertain whether I would have a job the following week. The only manager who treated me with respect was my first—after that, it was chaos and unprofessionalism.

Meanwhile, while employees struggled, leadership profited. Stores closed and people lost their stability. What was a matter of numbers for the company was a matter of mental health, livelihood, and dignity for employees.

Claire’s drained me of energy, hope, and self-worth. I left that job feeling broken, and the effects of my experience will stay with me.

That’s who Claire’s is: a company that values profit over people. They exploit employees, ignore problems, and discard staff without care. Never work for Claire’s.

In June of 2018, I came onboard to build the Concessions team in AZ and Southern CA. The first few months went as expected when building out a new team but then the cracks began to show going into the Holidays. Claire’s has absolutely no idea what they’re doing when it comes to running a Field Merchandising operation. They were never able to accurately supply stores with product, their sales goals for stores had no consistency and their expectations of time in store was unrealistic. 

They would expect a remote Field Team to process expenses and mileage by paper, refusing to use newer technologies that would make the job easier. The technology they did use, absolutely no one had any training on. I was the go to for any tech help for the entire Concessions department, going as far as creating an entire survey system for the European Division. Even their own in house Tech Specialist was woefully unprepared for the role. They utilized devices that they didn’t understand and refused to use to their fullest potential. Training on devices for the Merchandisers was nonexistent.  I had to spend extensive amounts of time creating training guides for other DMs because Corporate didn’t believe that they were necessary. 

The Regional Manager was equally unprepared and constantly made it clear that she had no idea what she was doing. She would never follow through on any promises or plans and offered no support. She would make fun of her employees behind their back and act extremely unprofessional. Upper management was equally demeaning and unhelpful. Promises of development for advancement were never seen to and amounted to lies. They were extremely resistant to change and would become agitated should you recommend that things be done differently. They would run tests that would require extensive amounts of extra work that amounted to nothing. 

In full transparency, I was terminated from Claire’s. The reason for this termination was that I was not performing my visits with my employees (I was and the Regional Manager refused to provide any evidence to support this claim) and that I falsified my expenses (even though it was done the way I was trained by another Regional Manager). 

In my 17 years in retail, Claire’s is the worst company I’ve ever worked for. When it comes to their Concessions Department, they are unable to manage allocations, payroll or even their own ISP. They are completely mismanaged and cannot perform their most basic function. The pay is mediocre at best, the benefits are lacking and the expectations are unrealistic. Avoid this company at all costs.

My experience at Claires was honestly so discouraging. Overall management was not management. The store I worked for had gone through so many ASM’s that they didn’t expect me to stay and therefore didn’t train me too well. A lot of my training centered around their EXTREMELY outdated closing and opening procedures which is obviously a company problem and not on the store I worked for. I have worked for many retail establishments and never had an hour long closing procedure. First I want to address company wide problems and the biggest one being mostly single coverage. I understand a lot of retail stores are like that but Claires really should not be one. Having a line of piercings and a line at the counter is unacceptable for the customers. The tasks one must complete throughout the day are near impossible to fully complete when you’re by yourself and doing piercings and checking out customers on their outdated and slow P.O.S. system. I could go into massive detail about how the store I worked at was completely terrible due to overall poor management... as an ASM my counterpart (the other ASM) did not treat me as an equal and unprofessionally told me she was “first” or something along those lines, despite me having a business degree and more experience than her. She truly was not management material at all, although I do believe she could have been and I blame my store manager and the overall company for not having a management training program like other retailers I worked for. No one likes being micro-managed but that was the only way in which she knew how to manage. When my store manager left for vacation it was maddening because she could not prioritize tasks well and literally didn’t do anything and let the shipment pile up to the point where I and other coworkers had anxiety over it. I can at least say my store manager did lead by example, she was always moving and working. Also there is no consequence if you are late which again, totally maddening. Honestly I so regret taking the job when I had other offers, and while my experience may not be like other stores I do know that with Claires having their poor coverage you wont want to work here, at least not as management. Gosh I would open some mornings and BE STARVING by the time I had coverage. I think that it’s likely that most stores will also have inexperienced managers here.... good luck to anyone that does work here.

I worked at the Galleria location which exposed me to different kinds of personalities. I enjoyed the experience of meeting people from all over the world and breaking me out of my shell. Management and co-workers at my location were all lovely and made my job more enjoyable than it would’ve been otherwise. For one, the pay is AWFUL for all the things you’re asked to do. You are to pierce ears from ages as early as 3 months and also do more complicated piercings like cartilage (which are unsafe to do with a piercing gun). You are made to maintain store appearance and organize merchandise which is hard to do when children are running a muck and most parents are oblivious and borderline negligent. It becomes extremely tiresome and burns you out by the time your shift is over, especially since it is frowned upon to reprimand children. You are also pressured to up-sale everything and push sales onto customers— none of which you see anything for. Bonuses are rigged as they have you working really hard for literally nothing. They have you compete with other districts to see who was the top seller only to give you a pizza party. All of that hard work for some pizza... and not at least a small bonus for the regular employees? Everything was so overpriced, you’d think they’d have the money for it. Luckily, our managers were awesome and would give us some kind of reimbursement (out of their own pockets) for our efforts. Last but definitely not least, customer base was extremely difficult. As you can imagine, you work mostly with children and parents. Most of the clientele were nightmares— extremely disrespectful to store merchandise and rude to employees. Extremely entitled. Constantly breaking things, stealing, not taking accountability for their children getting into the merchandise... I know that’s not Claire’s fault, but their policies and store design don’t make things easier for us either. Overall, would not recommend to anyone who pays bills or wants to keep their mental health in check, and I would never go back even if they gave me a raise. Oh, yes— after a year, I got a 50 cent raise. 50 CENTS. Yeah, Claire’s is not worth the time and trouble if you’re not equipped to handle that kind of environment or need more money. Hope this helps.

Claire’s is so far outdated in their tools, infrastructure, and organizational design it’s truly mind-blowing that they are able to continue to exist as a company.  Due to a product offering with great margins, brand loyalty, and strong marketing they continue to remain relevant in the retail space.  What is really impressive as an employee is when you see the behind the scenes and all that hard working people do to make the bare minimum possible.

If one has worked within any established company and joins Claire’s, the response and reaction to the company is consistent.  It’s one of disbelief.  How can a company be so far behind in basic tech and tools, or areas of the industry that have become standard expectations over the last few decades? That is what everyone experiences. How can a company never evolve the basic tools provided to employees, yet evolve expectations to those of modernized companies that have continuously invested?  These people stay at Claire’s for weeks or months, leaving as soon as possible to return to a realistic and sane workplace.

The culture is sad.  People enjoy one another, but share in the distain for the company and lacking leadership.  I’ve never experienced an environment where so many people at all levels can no longer maintain their professionalism, and collapse to the frustrations, openly venting at how incredibly frustrated they are with the culture and environment.  It’s discouraging and honestly depressing.

The company has been lucky enough to attract and hire many talented individuals, only to expect results aligning with their experience and skills without providing any of the tools or resources they previously had to deliver prior results.  I see this daily in the frustrations talented people express because they are facing not feeling successful in their careers for the first time ever.  It isn’t the talent, it’s the environment.

The enterprise has a ton of opportunity before this will ever be a workplace that is anything less than chaotic.  Buyer beware.

I should have listened to all the reviews for the Store Manager position before I took this job. Instead, I thought to myself, "Oh these are just disgruntled ex-employees who are just blaming the company for their failures". I have never been so wrong.

They expected Store Managers to do EVERYTHING. They give you only 40 hours to do things that require at least 50 hours a week to accomplish, but threaten to write you up if you go over your 40 hours. Instead of allowing you to take steps to get rid of employees that are making this harder for you to do (I.E.: writing up/firing employees that do not accomplish the tasks required of them), they protect them and blame you for everyone's shortcomings.

Unless you are having amazing sales numbers and not just a good "report card" (high average dollar sales and units per transactions), none of your successes will ever outweigh any of your shortcomings-- even if those shortcomings are mostly due to being short-staffed. They want you to think that as long as you are still having good customer service that you will be fine but that is not the case. In my area, local industry has completely shut down and the whole mall was facing low sales numbers. They will blame YOU for that, no matter how good you OR your team is with customers.

Which brings me to staffing. They do not give enough hours to keep any good employees, only people who only want a couple of hours and do not care what happens to you or your store, only that they get a paycheck. Instead of corporate/upper management having your back when customers complain or when employees complain about having to do too much, they quickly throw you under the bus.

I could go on for a very long time about all that is wrong with this place, but I know a lot of people will read this and think the same thing I did. That it will not be like that for them. I am writing all this in the hopes that I can save SOMEONE from the misery I have endured. Honestly, if you wish to retain any happiness in your life, DO NOT WORK AS A STORE MANAGER FOR CLAIRES!

Ok so I started with this company in 2018.
 I loved my staff and they loved me. Coming to work to see them, and working full open to close shifts daily the team made it better. My store was the fun store. I didn't have to micromanage anyone they came in a knew what to do. My Claire's stayed clean and we always had a crazy theme to dress up as every weekend. 
Dislikes:
What made me leave Claire's is that when your a manager and you don't have any help you have to open and close, you get in trouble for being tired,  Ive never called out one day since 2018 it's 2022, you can't close your store or you get in trouble. We didn't have a bathroom for over a year and had to close the store only when customers nleft to go use the bathroom.
Claire's doesn't care at all about work life balance. When your a manager at Claire's it's and nothing else.
 Conference calls on your days off must be dressed as if your going to work with your camera on. Messages /phone calls on your vacation, it's constant Claire's. It's so bad your phone has to stay in your hand 24-7 it's sad. So once I realized I missed 2 years of family vacation, spring breaks, kids birthdays due to being a manager and those days are black out days (which means you have to be in the store.) I left the company. They hire any and everyone, no background checks they hire just to keep the store open. Now my staff were the only reason I stayed so long. We're amazing while I was there. I just recently left 3/29/22. At some point they make you feel like it's your fault and your responsibility as a manager that you can't have days off. But once I snapped out of it and realized my family comes before any job I gladly put in my 2 weeks notice. I was sad only because I had the best staff ever! But they know how many days I had to open to close, I had to come in on days off, and I was beyond exhausted. Now I'm working from home in my brand new home enjoying life by the lake. With that being sad, this has been my honest review.
 If you want a job with non-work life balance, too much tasking, sales goals, constant calls on your days off, low pay with a heavy work load be my guest.  

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