cashier

grocery associate

produce clerk

meat cutter

front end manager

Fresh Thyme Market

The reality, however, is quite different. During the first few months of the store's life, things were very optimistic, with promising prospects for new employees to join and move up in a young, growing company. 6+ months later and a major change in upper management, and experienced team members find themselves missing out on advancement opportunities in favor of know-nothings from out of state.
A feedback loop of cutting hours, leading to losses in sales and service, is followed by the further cutting of hours, during which employees jump ship left and right, causing increased expectations (but not promotions or pay increases) for those who remain.
Nepotism is also an issue, with under-qualified individuals receiving promotions due to their relations with higher-ups in the company.
The management itself is also a major problem, from the Director of Operations and his rude, illogical, unrealistic demands to the Assistant Store Director who follows him faithfully (and seems to enjoy the privilege of being the real store director for doing so), this store is in shambles compared to what it was just a few months prior.

Pros:
  +Bright, friendly place to work
  +Nice benefits for the kind of job that it is (401k, vacations, and sick days)

Cons:
  -Management. I could probably write a novel on this one.
  -Hours are unreliable, full time employees beware of getting under 30 hours.
  -General dishonesty. Told the company had plans for advancement for you when you were hired? Not likely. Certain hours you'd be working? Fat chance. Job description? Entirely optional.
  -No advancement opportunities. Absolutely none. This is a company that will fly people in from across the country and hire from anywhere else before they ever even consider promoting from within a store.
  -While your job title and pay rate will not see any advancement, the number of skills you are expected to know and perform may deviate quite heavily from what you were told at the start, to your detriment.

All in all, this should have been a nice place to work, a fresh (no pun intended) company with lots of room for growth and advancement, nice benefits, and an overall positive team and outlook. It's unfortunate how the change of one person in the upper levels of management can make all of that disappear.

I worked Full-Time as a Produce Manager & transferred to Bloomington, Illinois from an Iowa store approximately a few weeks ago as a full time clerk. approximately 1.5 yrs. (14 months as Dept Mgr.) Condescending along with extremely poor & untrained management teams make for long days at this retailer.  Favoritism & friendship over hard work and dedication.  Their guide to training is just show up and attempt to do your job & hope someone with knowledge in your work area teaches you something useful. Typical day at work is having management who knows very little about your job trying to tell you how to do it.  Workplace culture is enjoyable if your in with the clique otherwise it's horrible.  The most enjoyable part of my job is clocking out for the day.  If it wasn't for the pay & benefits most would probably not be working there.  Some coworkers pretend to be friendly but complain  behind your back especially if they are use to doing substandard work and you call them out on it.  Management utilizes written documentation not as a tool but more as a  way to separate or punish those individuals who do not comply with them or their groups.  I had given my 2 week notice but could not stand to work around such people anymore. I tried to point out what was wrong & tried to fix it but I was targeted by these same individuals not wanting positive change.  Sorry I will not be disrespected & held to standards not the same for every employee across the board by anyone in any job title.  The so-called specialists and visiting corporate officials need to really spend some hands on time actually digging to the bottoms of displays for cleanliness and product rotation  (produce wet racks are disgusting underneath) Corporate should not allow management to put unskilled/untrained people in positions they are not ready for or cannot run correctly just because they are friends.

I started out as a part-time cashier and eventually ended up as the Body and Vitamin Care Manager for the Natural Living Department. I also worked as a Grocery Clerk for a few months. For the most part, management means well, but many times their hands were tied to address employee concerns of  being chronically short-staffed and the store not being able to hire additional help due to budget constraints. Employee morale seemed to always be low because of this, and it was not uncommon for staff to just quit outright. Starting pay for any position outside of management was lower than average, which didn't help efforts to recruit. One thing that really hurts the company is their tendency to hire several part-time staff (usually high schoolers) to be trained to work where needed instead of placing them in a specific department Thus, the part-time employee never gained enough product expertise to be able to help customers in any meaningful way. Store shelves were always in disarray due to employees not having enough time during their shift to properly face the department.

With all that said, in my various roles over the span of 5 years, I did feel like management had my back. They were very supportive and made sure I got the training I needed, especially once I became a department manager.  The benefits were nice, and the employee discount was generous. Sure they had high expectations of employees, but they were not unreasonable about it and tried to make it a fun and positive place to work. If you applied yourself and cared about customer service, promoting to a higher position was not out of reach.

If things do not change in three-to-five years, Fresh Thyme will join the list of failed retail "branch out" efforts from Meijer, who owns 51% of the company.  

Just look up the history of Meijer; they have a whole lineup of failed retail ventures. Who can forget such Meijer classics like Copper Rivet, Sagebrush, and Tansy? Or Spaar or Meijer Square? These efforts go back to the 70's and into the 1990's. In the 2000's, Meijer had rounds of layoffs after trying to expand too far beyond their Michigan roots against the Kroger and Wal-Mart machines.

In the end, it doesn't matter. If Meijer was serious about Fresh Thyme profitability, they would move the Fresh Thyme HQ out of Chicago and focus Fresh Thyme's footprint in Michigan where Meijer loyalty is BY FAR the strongest. They'd also trade legacy Sprouts, Sunflower, and Sears leadership to Earth Fare for a 7th round draft pick or their outright release. 

The last review of statistics shows Meijer has 242 stores and half (121 stores) are in Michigan. Clearly, Michigan loves Meijer and that's where Fresh Thyme should retrench their locations and headquarters. Openly tell Michiganders that Fresh Thyme is part of Meijer. Own it. Love it.

Fresh Thyme should forget the other states where they are trying to operate except for Indiana where Meijer is also a major player. 

Fresh Thyme needs to go smaller, clean house, and save money with their headquarters relocated to Michigan. Be a Michigan-centric healthy foods chain with 30-50 stores total and just be happy with it because the rest of the geographic footprint isn't working. 

And get rid of the corporate dead weight in Chicago and their overpaid marketing agencies along with the cavalcade of middle managers who accomplish about the same amount as the U.S. Congress.

Found it incredibly frustrating to solve problems or get questions answered with HR. Managers were either nice but disorganized and stressful, or severe and incommunicative. Rarely found my training to be sufficient, and found myself asking questions 2-3 months in that people seemed surprised I needed to ask. 

Despite them advertising "flexible hours" as a main selling point for new hires, I found it very difficult to communicate changing availability. Managers frequently got the availability I had communicates wrong, scheduling me when I wasn't available. I would also have silly mistakes on my schedule like being scheduled "8am to 4am" instead of 8am-4pm, or "9pm to 4pm" instesd of 4pm-9pm. Schedules aren't posted until the Friday evening before each week, meaning ~36hr notice before a Sunday morning shift, so those mistakes are difficult to clarify ans renegotiate when they do come up. They also do all of their scheduling, availability submissions, and time off requests on paper, with no digital tools available, so if you're not scheduled on a Friday evening or Saturday, you have to take time out to go into the store just to check the schedule.

Finally and most importantly - for a grocery store, their workplace policy and culture around COVID was abysmal - supervisors not wearing masks properly when speaking with customers, my choice to where gloves while handling produce being eye-rolled at, best cleaning practices/intervals not once being covered during training, and hand sanitization stations never being refilled - all in a time where local case numbers were rising and hospitals were full.

Overall I liked the job. PTO is good. Raises every 6 months. Full benefits. 15% employee discount on everything. I loved working for my direct manager. Always worked with my scheduling needs. Always gave me the time off I needed. Always did everything to make sure I was taken care of. 
The downfall with scheduling is that we are INSANELY understaffed and most of the store is over worked, but anytime a new person gets hired, our hours get cut to make up for labor. 
The "get real" motto is a complete lie. The amount of food this company THROWS in the TRASH is absurd. One of the managers doesn't approve of employees taking home damaged or expired products. They would rather throw it away. SOME of it gets donated. A very small amount. One of the employees tried to take the "bad produce" (which 80% of it wasn't actually bad it just didn't LOOK up to the company's standards) and either take it to a local church as donations or use it for composting. Corporate wouldn't allow it. A company that preaches about waste management but would rather have it all go in a dumpster. There are times we would have 10 (TEN) full sized grocery carts completely filled with out of date or "damaged" products (a small dent in the packaging is considered damaged and we can't sell it) and the store will throw away all 10 carts instead of doing something, ANYTHING, productive with it.
The products we sell are also not healthy like we advertise them to be. Not even close. 80% of the store is stocked with foods that are way too high in fat, sugar, and risky additives. The total opposite from the "get healthy" lifestyle the company tries to push on people. I chose this company because I loved what it stood for, but it turns out to all be a lie. 

Fresh Thyme, as a store, is delightful. It's a fun place to shop and a neat place to be. 
The working environment, not so much. 
It kinda takes a kind of toll on you. There are folks that invested themselves into working at Fresh Thyme but saw no harvest. They would do everything they could to make people want to come back to the store. These people were attentive and efficient. They knew where things were and would lead you right to it. They were the ones who would open up a bag of chips for you because you were wondering how they tasted. They always greeted you with a smile and made sure you had everything you needed and every questioned answered to the best of their ability. 
But these aren't the people that are praised. Instead, the good ones become frustrated and leave.They watch the management above them slowly steer the ship off course. Having a series of store directors and assistant store directors, feeling that they are being thrown at you so as to put a bandage on a gaping wound. Allowing employees to do what they want and fear no repercussion. Having "specialists" that don't seem that special. Managers that are inattentive to their departments. Customers telling you that they "expect you to be out of things" when they come to your store. Feeling like the people that choose products don't listen to the customers but instead to the dollars.

All-in-all, I am thankful for my thyme at Fresh Thyme. I met so many amazing people and I worked at a pretty nifty store. I really do hope that Fresh Thyme is able to get the stability it needs to bring back the passion had for the store. Both the customers and the employees.

It pains me to talk down on this store. I met a lot of good down to earth people here. But all I can say is DONT work for them if you value your life outside of work and especially don't expect a promotion or let a lone any recognition for that matter, unless you're as two faced as some of the managers. 

After 8 months that I put into this store and the 8 months I came in on days people were sick, quit or called out, this still didn't give me any sort of recognition or even more hours for that matter. Many false promises were given, almost every request I asked for was denied, and almost every thing went behind my back until the last 6 months when I found out they planned on firing me. I didn't give them this opportunity, so I requested a store transfer as a friendly way to quit the store. As soon as I got the position at a different store, I quit for financial reasons and health problems  (none of which were lies, but I still took it as an opportunity to leave the store).

I worked in a position that had skeleton staff (and it was me and 2 other women, one of whom complained every other day and talked behind people's back to entertain herself). As much as I enjoyed the job at times though, they shouldnt have backstabbed me as much as they did (especially since I came in 6 am - 2-3 pm nearly every other day). 

Towards the end, management was hoping to just cut off nearly all my hours as soon as they found someone who was willing to work in my department (which is part of how I know they planned to fire me and after hearing what several coworkers told me). Funny enough, this new employee quit less than a week as soon as I left. Anyways, don't expect them to reward you for your efforts. I'd rather work at walmart, and that's saying a lot.

When I started working at this company, I wanted full time. Was told I'd never get it but that part time was 25 hours per week. The only time I got that much was when someone went on vacation. I worked 16 hours a week to start, then it got cut down to 12 then cut again to 9. I repeatedly asked for more hours, never got them, though I was constantly promised that if I'd stick with it, I'd get more hours, just wait. The strange part is that while they kept cutting everyone's hours (except the few favorite people) they also kept hiring new people and having job fairs. Over half of the original crew quit before the store was even open one year and they all said the same thing, hours being cut, some down to one or two days per week. Why would you cut the hours of good hard working people then hire new people instead of giving the hours back to the ones who already knew what they were doing and did a good job? Seems like this store wants to fail. There is no training at all for any position, you are basically thrown out on the floor and expected to do your job, then when you don't do it the way they like you're told about it. The only way you learn how to do things right is to figure it out yourself or keep asking other employees how to do stuff. Don't get me wrong, I did enjoy the job, I enjoyed helping people and most of the customers were really nice as were most of the other employees. But management has no clue what they are doing. Even with a change of store manager and assistant manager, things did not improve. I really wish they had, I did like the job, it payed better than most jobs in the area, but the lack of hours and empty promises of more hours that never came was just too much.

I loved my job. It was rewarding and a lot of fun. The pay was pretty decent for the work, and the PTO for full time employees was generous. But management picked favorites constantly, and would give special treatment to whoever their favorite employee happened to be at the time. Conversely, they had a habit of picking someone to harass until they broke down and quit. I saw several of my employees crying in the stockroom and on the sales floor because of the way upper management spoke to them, usually over non-issues or poor communication on management's side of the situations. Furthermore, they continuously asked me to be in charge of more and more within my department, without any additional compensation. They took advantage of my curiosity and willingness to learn new things. The pay was good, but also wildly inconsistent amongst supervisors (yes, we talked about pay). Another thing was that management would constantly berate us for talking on downtime, or making conversation while doing our tasks, despite constantly chatting and laughing about non-work topics themselves. The hypocrisy in upper management was gross.

Overall, it should have been a good place to work. I hated having to leave - the job was fun, the pay was comfortable for my lifestyle, most of my coworkers were hard-working and fun to work with, the hours were great for supervisors and managers, but the abuse from upper management was NOT worth enduring.

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Cashier 295 salaries reported	$15.85 per hour
Grocery associate 245 salaries reported	$15.86 per hour
Produce clerk 210 salaries reported	$15.67 per hour
Meat cutter 118 salaries reported	$20.96 per hour
Front end manager 133 salaries reported	$20.08 per hour

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