shift leader

team member

donut maker

assistant manager

store manager

Duck Donuts

They trained us well but it was a high-pressure environment. It was difficult because we always felt like we were in a time crunch to do the most work in a minimal amount of time, and even if we finished all the orders quickly we’d have something else like cleaning the bathroom. They were very serious about breaks and no extra 5 minutes were ever given and we could only go on breaks at certain times even if we’d been working for 4 hours already. The workplace culture was good. It was pretty vibrant and everyone was generally pretty young just trying to prove themselves and their work ethic but friendly nonetheless. I joined the satisfaction of creating a beautiful box of donuts or milkshake or sundae at record pace and being able to give it to the customers. Honestly, it was kind of physically strenuous to decorate the donuts for hours and hours though, and I felt sore. I liked the way we were expected to interact with customers and welcome them when they came in even if we weren’t working register and I’m happy that they trained me for all the roles until I felt proficient. I liked the happy colors and music in the store. I disliked that they made us stop switching lives as much despite the incredibly messy nature of making donuts because they wanted to save materials.

The restaurant is always understaffed except for the weekends. As a new hire, you're thrown in and given a little guidance, but not much. If you're not able to be in a face-paced environment, DO NOT accept this job. You will start to hate it very quickly. There are days where it's pretty slow, and days where it seems as though there's no end to the amount of customers that come in. You will need to learn all stations because you will be thrown there if it is needed. They didn't hire an actual manager, they just made one of the employees the manager, and he's in no way qualified to be the manager AT ALL. It's pathetic. The owners is a married couple. The husband is actually pretty chill and allows you to get work done. But, he mainly works on the weekends. So, it'll be busy but he's pretty fun to work with so it balances out somewhat. However, the wife has the potential to be high passive aggressive towards you if you upset her in any way. Whenever someone she knows comes in the store, they suddenly become top priority, especially if its family members. 

In terms of co-workers, there's one actual adult and the rest is a mixture of high school students, college students, and young adults in their early 20s. Most of them are pretty chill and nice, but there are select ones that can never take a hint and create so much stress. 

I worked here for 3 weeks. The pay is NOT WORTH IT. I was a store manager ($13 per hour, even though I was promised $18 starting). The job description they give you in person and online does NOT match what you actually have to do. The pay schedule is ridiculous as well, you only get paid the 1st and 15th of every month and it’s not even consistent. Between scrubbing the toilets to perfection even if they were already clean, to burning you hands and hips everyday, to being poorly treated and different from others is horrible. I do not recommend this job to anyone. Sure it’s fun for the first 2-3 days and then they leave you alone and never check on you. The only job area I recommend for duck donuts is the topping table but not closing or opening I recommend a mid shift. It’s unfortunate with how other employees that are considered shift leads are always hiding in the bathrooms when it gets busy and your left by yourself during a rush as a new hire. And when they come back they shrug it off. As for the main employees they are miserable with how much they get paid and always complained about how little they get paid for how much they do ($7.25/hour). It’s just unfair. And the owner makes it seem like it’s such a fun place to work, when in reality it’s not. I’m not really sure how they remain open with how often they lose employees. 

If you're a high school student looking for a little bit of extra cash, this is your job. If you're seriously looking for a good amount of money to be made, look another way. 

Pros:
Probably one of the easiest jobs on the market regarding food service. Making donuts is easy and kind of fun if you like to be creative, not to mention it's hard to get a bad review because the donuts always look good. I loved working here with my friends because it's just a lot of standing around and talking to the people you work with. You make donuts 80% of the time, you prep the materials, you take orders at the register, you make coffee and drinks, and you clean at the end of the day. It's a job that literally anyone can do and there is not a lot of stress (unless it's a busy day/you're understaffed, but we'll get into that later).

Cons:
When it's busy, it's BUSY. Mother's Day, National Donut Day, etc are terrible at this place. Not to mention that the location I worked was almost constantly understaffed during the four years I worked there, so these days were not fun for little 15-year-old me. Also, the pay is awful, I worked here on and off for four years now and I haven't broken the $9 hourly pay. Other people have told me they get paid $11 or $12 but that's the max that I've heard.

Bad management, no one listened to the co-workers, coworkers are all college students so if you request off or have something personal come up no one covers you, you can work everyday and still have to pay for a full day of parking at the garage, penn state games charge $18 at the garage just for a 7 hour shift. They refuse to pay for your parking, I worked there for 2 years and no advancement and 1 raise. The schedule is never set in stone, always changing without notice, even if you have another job they want you there, they make you find yourself someone to cover you. Not the manager. Only a few good legitimate workers, there are some with no motivation to do anything except be on their phone. So yeah overall if you have bills and are a busy person it's not your place. Owners want nothing to do with the workers and the manager is running the business into the ground, the owners don't even help at the store they only occasionally help at hockey games because "they're fun" even though we need the help at the main store so they have sense of importance or respect for the workers.

Overall, the job itself is not hard. Making donuts and taking orders was a breeze. It was really fun making various donuts and recommending donuts to customers. Additionally the pay is great, for $20 an hour it is a good job. The fellow employees are super sweet and make the job bearable. However, management is extremely questionable. The owner never paid any mind to the store, never checking up or working there. There really is not any training, most of the time you will have to figure things out on your own, or an employee will have to help you. The main manager always had extreme expectations and often would treat employees horribly, often threatening to fire them and getting upset with them for childish things. Additionally, you were not given a set schedule or flexibility, often times having to cover shifts due to the manager constantly calling out or leaving early. If you could not cover a shift, they would threaten to fire you. Even on the busiest days there would only be two people working, which almost always led to working overtime. For 4-hour shifts, you get no option to take a 15 minute break. 

Working here has helped me grow as a person, engage in team work and open up to my community. Also, my manager is AWESOME!! She opened Duck to follow her passion of giving back to her family, and she treats the staff as her own. She always cooks for our staff meetings and has organized team events like laser-tag and escape the room so the staff can get to know each other better. She juggles around so much as the owner, so as a staff member we try to make her job the easiest by helping her organize catering orders and always being prepared. I was a waitress before this job and waitressing taught me a lot about multitasking and self-awareness. These skills i was able to enhance with my position at Duck as many tasks are individual but overall working twords a team goal. Giving back has always been the priority of this job and it has taught me that kindness will always make you a winner. Keeping up a good attitude is the key to success. Apart from making donuts and coffee all day we like to chit chat when we can and have fun, that is the best part! i would totally recommend this job to anyone in high school because it is easy to learn and everyone is between 15-22 years old.

I was hired as a cashier but I was also the barista, the donut maker, the breakfast sandwich maker, the ice cream maker, and the closed most of the time. My manager was very understanding about what days I could and could not work because of school but the place was a bit unorganized as coworkers often complained about each other. the morning shift would complain about the night shift and the night shift would complain about the morning shift. Other than complaining about what was not done perfectly, we all got along pretty well. I would say the hardest part of the job was when the manager wouldn't schedule enough people to work on the morning weekends. It was too much work for only two people especially when we were having any technical problems. Overall, it was a really fun job and I felt comfortable with everyone I worked with. This job helped me with my social anxiety and got me to interact with more people.

Fast paced and challenging.  Employees were awesome and had a fabulous team. Learned a lot of great skills in running a store. The customers were wonderful to work with. I truly enjoyed my job. 

The pay was comparable for that area and position but not worth it as the owners kept adding more tasks and requests on that weren't really part of position. 

Owners were frustrating. Lived far away and were around in a month less than the part timers worked in a week but yet managed the store as if they were there constantly and knew more about it than the in store management. Kept hiring people to replace other people but then would complain about how high labor was constantly. Kept trying to cut costs on anything and everything with little regard to how it would affect the staff or the customers experience.  Extremely high expectations of management and staff with tasks and productivity with little proper compensation for what is requested of them.

The management at this place is literally non existent they just let the store run on its own. There's no structure, no opportunity for advancement in the company, the owners along with managers are completely incompetent. They have taken one of the easiest running establishments and completely turned it into a mess. The pay and hours don't match so no full time year round positions available at all. It's a seasonal job for minors not adults who have financial priorities. The Surfside and North Myrtle Beach locations are ran by the same people so don't expect any difference at either store. If the management was actually doing their part and made the store a strong functioning establishment there wouldn't be any issues but instead of getting rid of the problem they just add more problems to the equation and solve absolutely nothing. Don't waste your time working for this so called Christian establishment that can't even take care of their employees.

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Shift leader 39 salaries reported	$14.70 per hour
Team member 36 salaries reported	$12.62 per hour
Donut maker 14 salaries reported	$12.46 per hour
Assistant manager 6 salaries reported	$14.92 per hour
Store manager 4 salaries reported	$18.88 per hour

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