service technician

machine operator

route sales representative

packer

production assistant

Farmer Brothers Coffee

Work-life balance
I'm a father of 3 wonderful kids. I am responsible for getting them to school/babysitter on time and picking them up. My wife works out of town and goes to work early and comes back late. Farmer Brothers had almost the perfect balance of work/life and I'm definitely looking for something as close. Though I did have days to where I had to work over or past 5pm but never later then 6pm to keep me from picking up my kids. I do understand that sometimes work can interfere with life or visa versa but Farmer Brothers was pretty family oriented.

Pay & benefits
We had PDO, which if you got sick or kids were sick I would have to take. They had a great set up though, with every month that was worked you would get 1.5 days off plus holidays. The benefits were pretty good and reasonably priced especially to have all the kids on as well. My wife and I didn't share the same insurance due to the outrageous pricing but it was more affordable to keep them on mine. The pay was pretty good but took a hit with the covid outbreak and raises were off the table... understandably.  Im looking for something that pays as much if not more with great benefits.

Job security and advancement
I much rather have job security then what I had there at Farmer Brothers. For the most part it was pretty secure until covid hit then took a dive. Advancement to a dive as well. No promotion or raises but job responsibilities increased and at times made it hard to complete everything in a days work due to no overtime and more traveling and warehouse duties.

Management
Communication is key for management and ours lacked that. He wasn't helpful at all when encountering problems out in the field so alot of the time I had to figure it out and fix the problems with his help. Unfortunately he would take credit for it and blame you. But I on the flip side I have had great managers from working at Farmer Brothers. He just was not one of them.

Culture
My experience was a lot of windshield time then work for an hour then back to the road. I had a 3 hour radius around Amarillo and for the most part I was able to handle at least 4-5 calls a day depending on where and how far out of reach they were. I had to rearrange my route for the day on a daily basis but usually able to get all the customers taken care of within 24 to 48 hours. It had its fast pace moments and slow moments but it always worked out.

Overall
My over all experience was great and I'd do it all over again. The company had its ups and downs with change of CEOs / management but over all I'd do it all over again. I loved the whole coffee and driving and what I did as a service tech. I got to meet wonderful people and not so pleasant people but to me they were what made my job there the best!

What is the best part of working at the company?
Management, by far the best management team I’ve ever had the pleasure of working with. They truly care about their employees. A good example is the training process for new hires. Their isn’t a set number of days to learn your job. This company cares more about the safety of their employees and will not put you in a position to fail, due to bad or improper training. That single fact alone meant a lot to me. I am a retail operator with Farmer Brothers an operate a complex machine that needs a lot of attention in order to run properly. An even though this line is a very profitable one, my supervisor who is the best, has made sure I’ve received the best training possible to insure I am able to run and maintain my line before the day comes when he says; today you are on your own.
That’s what make this company special. They will not throw you in before you are ready. An this is why I am with Farmer Brothers.

What is the most stressful part about working at the company?
Dealing with situations within production that are simply out of your control. Your line being down due to a mechanical issue that you as an operator can not solve. 

What is the work environment and culture like at the company?
Competitive, we as operators check each other’s numbers, to see who ran the most product for the day. All in good fun, but it also brings out the best in the teams running these machines.

What is a typical day like for you at the company?
Learning, you are always learning new things about your machine as well as the people you work with. You learn the strengths and weaknesses on the line, you learn how to move and utilize their skills to make your core group better. You learn a lot about yourself also, and where your own limits lie.

Was so excited to work here when I got hired that feeling didn’t last long. No room for advancement, very high turnover rate for multiple reasons. Pay is decent nothing more than 2 people could reasonably live off of. So if you have kids keep that second job. Raises are typically less than half a dollar a year if you meet eligibility requirements. You do max out in a very short amount of years. Management kind of sucks in all departments. I’ve seen several managers supervisors leads even the plant manager come and go within a matter of a few weeks to a few months. Management won’t do much to help you if you have any issues. HR on the other hand is very reliable might be the best department in the building. There is no culture a bunch of grown kids playing work. high turnover equals a lot of lazy people who don’t follow rules of course to expect so you would have to have the right management in place to enforce those rules I suppose. Hardest part of the job is trying to work with any other department when it comes to things needing to be done.  Overall you’ll get a steady check if you can hold on to your job they make it hard with the point system they have in play. Management plays favorites and doesn’t even try to hide it some managers will lie to let friends keep their jobs. To be honest the most enjoyable part about work is clocking out and that’s not just a “no one likes to be at work” comment. 

I worked in HR/Talent Acquisition at Farmer Brothers for nearly two years, and during that time, I witnessed multiple rounds of layoffs. Unfortunately, it seemed that leadership and finance teams lacked a clear direction—there were ambitious plans but consistently poor execution. Employee well-being wasn’t a priority for top management. Bonuses were canceled, annual merit increases were cut, benefit costs went up, and PTO for new hires was reduced. They even removed the 401(k) match. The turnover rate was incredibly high, partly due to the absence of any formal training programs.

In HR specifically, management left a lot to be desired. The newest Director of HR, filled the team with former colleagues on high salaries, while pushing everyone else out. Management was out of touch and gave very poor direction, giving little to no help on any project I managed. Toward the end, I was handling all recruiting for the entire company alone, while also managing large-scale projects that would impact new processes. I was repeatedly told I was doing a great job and that my work was impressive. However, I was let go for 'performance,' right after I finished training the new staff and being told I came in "clutch" on several occasions.

Be prepared to take on significantly more work than you’d expect, as the company’s layoffs continue and workloads are combined under fewer employees. Overall, it was a tough environment with little support for employee growth or satisfaction.

What is the best part of working at the company?
Co-workers and the industry itself

What is the most stressful part about working at the company?
Micromanagement, avoidable supply chain issues, very poor communication between all levels of the organization, very poor unqualified upper management, huge disconnection between upper management and workers at the branch level

What is the work environment and culture like at the company?
The culture is terrible. Upper management makes decisions without notice and leaves the field to scramble and pick up the pieces. This company does not care about it’s employees. They only care about the stock owners. This company will be out of business within the next 3-5 years because of poor leadership on every level except the branches. Even those are hit or miss.

What is a typical day like for you at the company?
Putting out fires that could have easily been avoided and were created by poor decisions and communication.

Farmer Brothers unfortunately had upper executive management that did not look out for it's route sales reps. 
Company panders more to the mid west and west coast aspect of business.
Managers seemed to have no execution plan or price guidelines other than to go out and sell.
Company had many different contracts with certain restaurant chains and corporate kitchen groups. It was confusing to know which coffee you could sell to certain person or group or not. Was never informed by management. 
Was told job would be easy almost like working a part time job by management.  But it turned into being a full time job. 
Management would get angry if you got done early,even though it was stated that it would be more like a part time job than full time job. 
Benefits and compensation were not bad..
Upper executive management always looking to have sales rep drivers do more work for less pay. 
If you can apply somewhere elae.

A typical day for me is busy. There’s always something different going on. My management is pretty much there for me. Training is minimal I believe in all departments. I believe work life balance is pretty good except in some departments like sales. If anyone is out without notice (i.e calls in sick) it creates a problem for their customers.  I believe they’re pay-scale is way off. HR says they keep up with salary market trends but, that’s not true at all.  They definitely low ball pay.  They have great benefits i.e. insurance, HSA cards, 401K, start off with 15 days of PDO and some floating holidays to use however you want.  Work life balance in most departments is either hybrid or at home 100% besides sales of course. So you know how most CEOs bring in their own “cronies” from past companies/jobs to fill upper positions….that is what has happened here and most not really suited for the job and way overpaid.

I worked for farmer brothers for 21 years and was furloughed and then permanently laid off due to covid. They ended up keeping less qualified less experienced employees just to save a few bucks. The person I eventually ended up training has the job I should have been offered. I can not stress enough that this company has terrible management they do not promote from within so they are constantly hiring management that have no clue what they are doing. This company has been losing money for years and I would not recommend it to anyone that is looking for a company to advance their career. I made the mistake of getting off my delivery truck to get into management 3 weeks later the job was eliminated and I was given a job that I didn’t want with out of state travel involved. I wasn’t even offered my delivery job back. If you have any other options run from this company. 

I worked for this company for almost 6 years. For the first 2 years it was a good company to work for I really enjoyed it. After that, they moved corporate to Texas and everything changed. They kept making wrong decision after wrong decision. For this company California is union but Texas is not. So they constantly would bend or break the union rules. Corporate and management knows what they are doing. They will always gossip and tell lies to get what they want. They do not care about the employee. I would go the extra mile and not once did I hear a "good job" or "thank you". They only focused on the negative. When you start you are RSA. which means warehouse but what they do  not tell you is they will send you to any warehouse in cali to work.  No matter how far it is.   Unless the corporate and management changes (which it probably won't)  I do not suggest to work for this company.

Work-life balance
Work-life balance at Farmer Brothers Coffee is terrible. Surprise your working every Saturday because leadership can’t get a schedule in place and products to the staging

Pay & benefits
My pay and benefits at Farmer Brothers Coffee are fair but you live There

Job security and advancement
In terms of job security at Farmer Brothers Coffee, I think they furlough and terminated as a first choice instead of a last resort

Management
In general, managers at Farmer Brothers Coffee shady and care about themselves

Culture
Collaboration with my colleagues at Farmer Brothers Coffee is stressful and fruitless

Overall
My experience working at Farmer Brothers Coffee was stressful, lots of people moving up that couldn’t do the job they had and people that carried the load were expected to make up the difference for the leaderships friends

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Service technician 90 salaries reported	$24.26 per hour
Machine operator 32 salaries reported	$18.41 per hour
Route sales representative 1 salary reported	$19.00 per hour
Packer 32 salaries reported	$15.59 per hour
Production assistant 28 salaries reported	$14.46 per hour

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