cashier

operator

mechanic

general manager

shift manager

K1 Speed

The company is very prone to making snap decisions that are often made without any type of forethought. These decisions are made and implemented almost overnight and a majority of the time are not communicated with the GMs/Managers of the locations outside of California (where HQ is located). A majority of the time, GMs find out about new promotions or new events via an email blast that we send to our customers which leaves us with little to no information and it also makes it so that we are unable to answer any customer questions until we eventually hear back from someone in corporate about it.

The company also does a wonderful job of taking advantage of manager's salaries by having a 50hr minimum workweek as well as increasing the amount of work that needs to be done by the GM/Manager without increasing the pay. They try to entice you by having an achievable bonus structure, but the bonus structure can be changed by corporate at any time for any reason and it has changed 3 times since the start of 2018. To make matters worse, they often set the goals too high to be achieved by regular means.

Communication between corporate and individual centers is lackluster at best and they often ask for input from us as GMs/Managers as a means of appeasing us because there have been so many complaints about issues falling on deaf ears in the past.

Lastly, and perhaps most alarmingly, is the overall compensation that the company has been giving to their newest hires. Because the company is struggling financially, they have started to lay off high-performance individuals that make a decent salary in order to replace them with less-competent, much cheaper, workers who are new to the company and have no real idea what others in their position are typically paid. If you are thinking of joining the company, be very aware that they will be offering you much less than what others in your exact same position are making. The company is currently trending toward dramatically increasing the workload of us as GM's while keeping wages stagnant for everyone across the board.

I worked there for 5 years, started off as a Track Operator and worked my way up to Supervisor. DO NOT work here if you have back problems, and if you don't have back problems, you will. What they fail to mention in their job posts is that you will have to lift 430 pound karts off of each other when, not if, there is an accident. There are a lot of bad crashes, daily. A lot of my former coworkers were injured while trying to help people after accidents. We were not trained on how to safely lift the karts, or deal with the outcome of crashes (injuries requiring immediate medical attention/blunt force trauma at high velocity). All we were told was "lift the kart off, call 911 if it's bad enough" and no further training was implemented even after it was clear that the building was a hotspot for injuries. Aside from the safety aspect, the facility was severely understaffed. I know everyone says that when they're busy, but I'm talking 5 people minimum needed to do the job even moderately well, and corporate would only give us a budget to fill 3/5 positions. This directly led to an increase in injuries, angry customers, high wait times, etc. If you don't have the money to operate your business at full efficiency, don't open, especially when people's health is at risk.
During my employment, I learned a lot about K1's structure. Corporate stiff arms locations on needed materials and inquiries, and then proceeds to get mad at the location when an issue stems DIRECTLY from what we had inquired/requested. They blame their shortcomings of profit on location employees instead of realizing that their Marketing Dept is an absolute mess. Corporate heads will act like a team when giving speeches/presentations, and then immediately throw each other under the bus shortly after. It seems none of them are on the same page, and give you cookie-cut responses instead of actually addressing any issues. 

A Typical Day at Work:
Expect chaos, confusion, and being yelled at for things outside of your control. You’ll run around putting out fires all day while corporate ignores your calls. “Teamwork” here means doing everyone else’s job because nobody is trained properly- including MYSELF. I was hired on as a manager with the promise to be promoted to General Store Manager if I met all of my goals. My "training" was 2.5 days and then the corporate person flew to another store and threw me to the wolves.

What I Learned:
I learned how NOT to run a business, how to manage stress on zero support, and how to recognize red flags in leadership before accepting a job. If you stay long enough, you’ll also learn that hard work and loyalty mean absolutely nothing here.

Upper Management/Corporate:
Unprofessional doesn’t even begin to cover it. They play favorites, micromanage the wrong people, and disappear when real problems arise. Feedback is ignored, and accountability only applies to employees & onsite managers—never upper management. The turnover rate is a direct reflection of how poorly this place is run.

Workplace Culture:
Toxic and exhausting. Morale is nonexistent, and the only consistent culture is one of blame and burnout. If you’re hoping for a positive team environment, keep hoping—this place will drain your energy and enthusiasm fast.

The Hardest Part of the Job:
Trying to stay motivated while being constantly disrespected and undervalued. You’ll be expected to do the work of three people with the resources of half a person.

The Most Enjoyable Part of the Job:
Clocking out. Honestly, the only good part of working here was leaving each day and eventually not having to go back.

Staring out in the position, I was o.k. with making $11/hr because I had basically no experience working on go-karts. Now, after a year, I would say I'm at least 3 times more productive because I actually know how to fix everything on the karts without any instruction. The company doesn't reward good work ethic, and it doesn't reward the development of employees. At my location specifically, they have re-hired people who have walked out, and one of the regional managers is an example of this - so they seem to reward disloyalty. The company ethics are ridiculous. I don't get paid more as a result of being more productive and I have to have a second job to make a living even though I work full time at K1.

Leadership and management are a joke. Distributions centers regularly take WEEKS to fill our parts orders, often not even sending the right parts to us making our jobs as mechanics sometimes impossible - yet we are reprimanded for things outside of our control. The job is fun, I like working there, but am HIGHLY undervalued considering the importance of the position to the daily operations. If there are no working karts, there is no business - and mechanics are expected to do EVERYTHING from electrical work to welding frames... all for a measly 11/hr? What a crock.

Loved working here when I was first hired on.  Everyone gets along great and we loved working for/with each other. Everyone is welcoming.  Everything ran smoothly for the most part.  ( Difficult to do when busy but every location is like that) 
Typical work day is greeting customers, answering questions in person and on the phone, giving wait times and adding people to races. Crazy on weekends and slow on weekdays but really fun because you meet nice people!  Some times famous people, like Bulls, Bears and Cubs players come in.
Place was hurting for an additional manager so hired one with experience.  HE IS SO RUDE!!! NEVER MET SOMEONE SO DISRESPECTFUL IN MY LIFE.  Admitted he does not like his staff and lies to us all the time.  Rude too customers as well.  Very degrading.  He likes to watch us in his office and never gives us positive feedback.. Makes working here unbearable.  Came in to help on my day off and when I had to leave, the manager said I was not allowed to!! Very unfortunate how this place has turned out.   Many have quit because of him.  Manager has favored kids only he hires.  Customers complain all the time.  He has made employees cry too :(

A typical day at K-1 Speed involves straightforward tasks, especially in the pit crew role, which includes responsibilities like kart pushing, ensuring smooth races, assisting customers with seating, and explaining rules.

Cashiering tasks are relatively uncomplicated, mainly encompassing checking in customers, processing race purchases, and assigning participants to races.

One of the more challenging aspects of the job is dealing with customers, as they sometimes present unique difficulties that can make the role more demanding than anticipated. Instances of children becoming upset due to restrictions or crashes during races can add complexity to the job.

I would particularly recommend this job to younger individuals, particularly those aged 15-18, who may find it a valuable experience. However, it’s important to note that if you’re looking for a long-term career or consistent income growth, this might not be the ideal path. Expectations regarding pay tend to remain consistent after starting, and opportunities for raises are limited. Personally, I would have considered staying if the compensation better reflected the effort I put in or if raises were provided over the years.

The Bellevue-Redmond location is a great first job, part time gig for extra cash, but does not seem to cover cost of living alone around this area. 

My favorite part of this job has to be the fast paced environment and coworkers here. The way K1 operates keeps me busy at all times, even when we're slow there's something to do. By the way, the job is easy, laid back (for the most part), and fun. The coworkers are always willing to help if you need it, willing to share their methods, willing to be there as a 'family,' if you will.

The worst part about this job is the corporate world and the pay. Pay starts at $12 an hour at the time of this review, and employee reviews are once a year, and mostly your only chance at raises unless you are promoted. Corporate is stingey with what they give us, sending us non-refurbished motors as we are the only center that still uses the style of kart that we do, but will change something if a customer complains, just not staff. We have recently had a track design change, new flooring, and have had attempts to have our A/C fixed for the summer. Other than that, corporate seems to try and minimize the amount of money they spend on our center and maximize profit.

TL;DR: Fun job, bad pay, bad corporate.

It’s a good job if you want to get in your feet for about a month or 2, otherwise I wouldn’t even recommend for a part time college student as the pay does not match the labor and the hours of open business. Tips are split between everyone and most times people don’t tip because of how expensive it is already. Management/Higher-ups are close friends, at least that’s what it seems like, and creates a strange atmosphere between hourly employees and salary employees. HR is there to help employees, but it seems regional managers, general managers, and directors of operations use them obviously for help in different aspects, but also as a tool to seek insight on how we can “Fire” a certain employee and what they can do to get them removed. It’s strange. The culture is very one sided in comparison to other companies I’ve worked for. Perhaps it’s just my location, but it seem with every new regional manger I get it’s similar. K1 needs to improve the culture. I feel like the think since go karts are pretty cool themselves, that’s enough to keep employees satisfied. That completely false. K1 needs to take role models and develop their business ethics when it comes to to employees labor and satisfaction. 

While I loved the co-workers and managers I had at K1, that was not enough to say this experience was worth it. We had the terrible opportunity of being shut down overnight without warning from our higher-ups. When I say we had no idea we were shutting down, I mean even our managers and regional manager had no idea until they were called in the morning of and told we were no longer open starting from there on out. K1 Speed is a sneaky and greedy corporation that does not care about the little people. Definitely a different type of minimum wage job and was fun while it lasted. I would not recommend going into that job thinking it will be something permanent. If you're looking for some extra cash while in between jobs and don't wanna work at a restaurant or another same old same old place I would recommend. Its fast-paced and doesn't always give you a minute to breath but lets the time go by fast. Customers will complain to you about things out of your control but that's retail. The best part (for me) was the fun co-workers we had. But I also enjoyed the few customers, usually from parties, who would come up and thank us for the great time they had. People like them made the job worth coming in for.

Working at K1 is worth it if you want a part time job. It's also a good place if you're in school. For full time employees, it SUCKS! This is me, trying to be unbiased as possible. I used to work every single day and get paid only $500-600. This amount was also during a two week period. So for a full two weeks, I would only get paid that amount. Being a cashier at K1 Speed, managers and supervisors claim you get hourly, commission, and tips but, I definitely do not think that is the case at all. Managers will remain lazy and try to act like they care about your money when you speak up but, when you ask about it over and over again they will reply "I'm looking into it." The good employees are highly underpaid. Being at the company for about 3/4 years, I am surprised I stayed that long. Even when staff complains about management and they hire a new one to come to location, the managers would not know what they are doing and as staff members we would have to basically do their job for them... even though they get paid way more than the actual staff members.

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Cashier 18 salaries reported	$16.56 per hour
Operator 27 salaries reported	$16.60 per hour
Mechanic 38 salaries reported	$19.64 per hour
General manager 19 salaries reported	$76,711 per year
Shift manager 4 salaries reported	$19.51 per hour

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