maintenance mechanic

crew leader

forklift operator

laborer

refrigeration technician

Fresh Express

I have never spoke bad about a company I have worked for before now.  I should have trusted my gut after dealing with HR in the hiring process and never accepted a job at Fresh Express.  They were unprofessional and unpolished.  

There is no training or expectations set when you start (took me 7 months to get trained on half of my responsibilities). CFO does not review finances with team before presenting with owner and then is quick to point fingers and pass the blame when he looks bad in front of him.  C-suite are "yes boys" that have experience in the industry but are quick to jump to do something that doesn't make sense and without discussion just because the owner says so.  Owner's management style is very totalitarian and all he cares about is finding all ways to slash costs no matter the detriment.

If you have a position with exposure to the owner be expected to be constantly working fire drills to meet his demands.  Sadly, this is mostly formatting worksheets (changing colors of cells) and rearranging data already being presented.  Many times I was asked to finish things in an unrealistic time frame for the owner and worked many nights till midnight.

I actually really enjoyed the work I did - I found the industry interesting.  The management, understaffed department and the systems (old AS400) made it hard for me to do real analysis and make a difference to the company.

Last but most certainly not least, vacation was taken away as of January 1, 2017.  Employees were notified by HR in the second week of January that vacation policy was changing to accruing in current year to use the year after.  The only vacation that could be taken was what was left in your bucket from 2016.  Being that most people were hired in 2016 (turnover is horrible because company does not treat it's number 1 assets - their employees - as their number 1 asset) and used some vacation at Christmas time, most people were left with less than a week.  Many complaints and concerns were filed by employees but in March HR once again had a corporate wide meeting to let everyone know nothing had changed despite the negative feedback across the board.  

I wouldn't recommend this job to anyone, unless you needed good health insurance...that is the ONE great benefit.  Seeing that this is so good, i expect management will change it soon to save money.

I'm not even sure why I accepted this job in the first place. I guess it was due to the fact that it was walking distance from where I live in which of course, that only lasted about 2 months after I was hired, when they decided to move to Windermere. The salary on the job posting was decent, but when they offered me the job, it was much less. (Exploiting people with low pay) The company offers no training whatsoever, other than sitting you side by side with another employee (that certainly had no time, and a lot of responsibilities on his/her plate) for about a week. After that, you were on your own. When approaching the person for guidance, that was assigned to "train me", that person will criticize me severely with my management. The manager would conduct meetings, and he would make eye contact with everyone but me, making me feel unappreciated, uncomfortable and not welcomed. (Everyone in my department was white except for me, so go figure). This was a dead-end job with no opportunities for growth. A typical day at this job was coming in, and pray to get some type of recognition from management for getting something accomplished. This company had no structure whatsoever. The hardest part of the job was, finding a strategy that best worked in order to get things done on a daily basis. The most enjoyable part of the job was leaving at the end of the shift, and counting the days for Fridays to come. Pros: Steady paychecks, vacation time and location. Cons: Racist environment. Low pay. Extremely stressful. No structure. No guidance. No training.  
   

Management is made up of people who only care about themselves and the Logistics department since that was there area of expertise before they were promoted to management. 

Production doesn’t even have a production manager. So we take commands from the GM(once the Logistics Manger) who is rarely on the floor but only when there is a problem on the floor. Meaning the GM only steps out when downtime effects the numbers we need to hit and if we have important person on the floor. 

Production isn’t very productive due to the machines that have been there for over 25 years and when it breaks down …. we have no parts because they don’t make them anymore! Go figure! 

Oh… let’s not forget then the horrible environment conditions. They use chlorine and have ammonia in the air that stings the eyes and results in horrible coughing and people throwing up often. They also run raw onions …. so mix that with the chemicals and you better hope you brought eyedrops… even though it won’t do nothing for you. They have been “trying” to find a solution to fix the air quality in there. When in reality the the “solution” has been sitting in someone’s desk for 15 years. But hey… let me give you a sticker for your helmet to help fix all those problems. 

Don’t get me started on the supposed “budget” that prevents anything from getting done when it comes to the production department. Instead … let’s remodel the Logistics office… yeah that’ll do it. 

I used to enjoy coming to work …. when Management actually cared and did something. As long as these people are sitting in those chairs, nothings gonna change. 

I accepted one position and with weeks was called into a meeting and given a completely different role with different responsibilities. Was told no longer had vacation until my second year. Had 3 different managers within my first 6 months and was only communicated once I inquired after knowing my old manager quit.  No real structure or communication of job functions and or expectations.  A complete lack of direction and little to no communication from managers or leaders. Was told after the first quarter of the new year that bonus for the prior year may not be paid out and if they are they do not know when.  I went months with no permanent seat/desk yet was told no working from home.  Spent some days working off my laptop sitting at a picnic table, it was great for my back and eyes. 

HR department is probably the worst I've seen in my career.  Very unprofessional and down right rude.  Employees are manipulated and lied to.  

Leadership is more concerned with the colors and how big they can make an excel model then it's accuracy and functionality.

Take this only if you are desperate for a pay check.  Do not come here if you want a professional setting with managers who care to develop and teach you.  There is no training of any kind here. Only time you hear from managers are when you do something wrong that you were never told was wrong in the first place.  Open office environment where you sit at tables yet you can wear ear buds. No personal items on your desk.

I was the top picker on 2nd/3rd shift most nights. Always loaded the trucks right. Always fixed trucks. I was a top 2 hard worker in the 5 months i was in this department. If you love to work hard, not talk the majority of your shift. This job won't be for you. If your not a hard worker this job is perfect for you. I was a forklift operator but this is by far was the most unorganized company. I was ever associated with. You never know the right amount of pallets for trucks. Until the truck is almost done then you must unload it to load it again. If someone missed pallets or loaded it out of order and this happens often.Very small storage for pallets, most forklift chargers don't work properly. People worked at fresh express for 15+ year and got 1.50 to 2.00 raises. They never promotion the hard working people but let they'll hire under qualifying people just to fill a position. A supervisor assaulted me but yet I lose my job when he push me across the hallway.I grab the supervisor arms back. If course fire the hardest worker y'all got most nights. I honestly never would work here again and would tell great workers to leave asap. This job is for rookies and people scared to go to an organized company.

FreshExpress unfortunately does not give opportunity for employees to learn and grow into promotions or other areas of cross training. Managers are often strapped for time due to the constantly back and forth defense mode they must be in to survive all the finger pointing of the day to day plant/ team failures. Due to this often only negative feedback is given, and followed up on, and the “no news is good new” assumption is standard operating procedure. Most employees lose their drive and settle into the “why should I give 120% if no one else does” routine after realizing the only thing a good work ethic will get you is more work, while other people scoot by on incompetence (and therefore are never given more work). Managers get bonuses based on performance of departments but their staff and intermediate level supervisors do not even get get annual cost of living increases despite the profitability of the company. Do not go to Fresh Express if you pride yourself on your work ethic and your self esteem is tied to you success at work. Do not go to FreshExpress if you want to work in a positive team atmosphere. & Most of all do not go to FreshExpress if you expect a decent work life balance.

Great company beside allowing people to show up late and not going by there point system in disciplining who they have favoritism towards, people aren’t held to the standards, company needs to find a way to manage how they’re loaders work instead of allowing them to cary 20min conversation while supervisor sits in office, besides that environment is great if everyone is working and doing there job Title hours go by quickly, and the pint system is Great. Compared to other companies they have a lot of slack on being understanding, idk why others bash on this company but it isn’t hard when you signed up for a job that tells you long work hours people complain about short days and they complain about long days as well they complain about the pay yet it pays more then other companies, the job is great beside hearing ur coworkers complain every day about something they signed up for when being hired. Fresh Express is a great company!!!!! 5 Stars ⭐️ Hands Down!!!!!

A typical day at work depends on your position. For me, it was very tough to keep up with production. Unless you are an athlete or drink 2 energy drinks per day, your body will give up on you. Especially if you are an over achiever. Slowly but surely, the 3 hour Sunday over time will catch up to you and drain your energy. It’s hard to stay positive when you’re over worked constantly. It’s almost like you’re on a treadmill but the treadmill doesn’t have a stop button. Management doesn’t have feelings. They don’t care about you, they “act” like they do but you can see right through their facade. A lot of favoritism, if you get along well with crew leaders, management, go above and beyond, you still don’t have chance of getting favorited. Although it is quite hard to maintain good relationships with management since they treat you like cattle. I encourage a reporter to go in there as an imposter for at least a week to see how badly that place needs to get humanized.

Production is bad, any other area I hear is great. 
 Dont mind overtime but they MADE us work 6 days straight (MANDATORY)  Monday - Saturday sometimes we even had to work on Sunday 
Which means 14 days straight. 
 
You Dont always receive a 2nd break and your working from 3pm - until they say your line can leave and no earlier than that. Which could be 6am

No help from managers, they sit in the office all night 
And God forbid something come up and you need to leave early or are late because they simply don't care and are rude about it 
They have you do other postions your not trained in or paid for. They don't push health guidelines unless there's gonna be a audit from customers. 
In a year you have certain amount of PTO if something comes up after PTO is used they don't allow you to request a unpaid day off or its points or write up against you.

They have good benifits for full time workers.

Typical day would include assisting customers with purchases of fuel and goods. Also maintain appearance and any issues that may occur. Stocking all products and completing inventory

I learned how to work in a fast pace environment on my own. Multi-tasking is something I am used to however this went above and beyond your typical one person work load. 

Management was at times difficult to deal with. Two managers during my employment with very different ideas on how to run things. It was difficult to get them to understand an employee’s point of view.  

Hardest part of job was working for 8 hour shifts alone with no breaks and being expected to have everything in tip top shape by the end. If there was an issue there was hardly anyone available for assistance. 

Favorite part was the customers – made my day go by faster and human interaction can usually be a pleasant experience, for the most part.

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Maintenance mechanic 11 salaries reported	$29.28 per hour
Crew leader 7 salaries reported	$20.42 per hour
Forklift operator 7 salaries reported	$20.79 per hour
Laborer 8 salaries reported	$18.77 per hour
Refrigeration technician 5 salaries reported	$26.65 per hour

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