manufacturing specialist

packer

supply chain analyst

assistant engineer

truck driver

Lacks Enterprises

I worked as a temp at lack for a few months as a Hilo driver in shipping and receiving. My function was to load and unload trucks and well as pick and put away various packages in the warehouse. Doing the work itself I found to be fun. It was very fast paced and sometimes stressful. But overall the job itself was good work. Where things fell short is you WILL work a boat load of overtime. You will put  in 50-70 hours a week and frequently work weekends. I slammed in 60 hour work weeks and weekends for a month straight for example. This is do to the totem poll system among workers in which those with more experience have first dibs on rather to work overtime or not. Some did opt to work overtime for the pay period because they do want/ need the extra money. Allot of established workers did not. This leaves new employees or those who have the least about of time working for Lack being dumped overtime rather they wanted to work the OT or not. Lacks will preach the gospel that overtime is voluntary. In reality you might as well regard overtime as mandatory until you have some years under your belt and new people come in behind you. 

That said. Doing the Job itself is good. I love driving Hilo. If my back had not given out and my doc telling me to change career fields or risk permanent damage to my back I would continue driving Hilo rather for Lacks  or another employer. However if you have a personal life, a family you want to be with, or enjoy the relationship you have with your sweetheart, avoid working for Lacks. Work/life balance is abysmal.  But if you are by yourself and have little else to do with your life and looking to get as much overtime in as humanly possible and have the physical and mental fortitude to do it then by all means apply for a shipping and receiving position at Lacks.

Lacks is nowhere near what this company was 15 years ago. From proud, family owned company, West Michigan company, Lacks switched to...numbers and $$$ only count. Good company if you need tons of overtime hours to fetch money to clean your debts and get you started with your own project somewhere else. As soon as you save enough, proceed with your life plans. I did it, left Lacks 6 months ago, move to the South, found completely different job with new working environment and working mentality but I still keep in touch with some good, hard working friends. None of my former work friends is related to managing positions. None of them. Hard working people are located on the production floor, not in office or cubicle where buddies and family relations play monster role. 
Lacks increased company size tremendously in last 10 years, doubled in number of facilities, doubled with equipment and work stations inside buildings but lately company have huge shortage of good people. Huge shortage of working people and hard time hiring any new employees. Low start pays, no 401K match, no HSA match, lousy Health Care and no benefits do not help at all in hiring. Bad rumor did spread so nobody knocks on the door anymore asking to be hired. Some of the new hires leaving as soon as they can, some of them did not even show up first day, or did not pass tests or they work few weeks and they are gone. In meantime experienced employees have no raises, no respect, countless overtime hours so they getting really edgy and disgruntled.
Safety in Lacks is good. I worked shortly in plating facility but mostly in assembly plant, it was great, great experience and learning curve in my life, thank you for that but now is time to have safer and happier life. Good luck hard working people, good luck.         

Lacks is a typical family owned business (manufacturer) that has been around for several decades.  Management style is still command and control driven down from the older generation.  They are stable and offer advancement within the production realm. 

However, if you are not family or friends of the family you will never leave the production world.  Roles not directly related to the actual  work done to make auto parts e.g. engineering, HR, sales, etc. are filled by family and FOF or their children when they leave college - if they go.  Everyone else feeds the machine 7-days a week when auto sales are good and layoffs when auto sales are down.  Typical family owned business - you work weekends we leave early on Fridays.
 
However, they are stable and try to retain hard workers when times are tight.  Health insurance is OK, their 401K match is phenomenal, bonuses are fairly regular (based on sales) and if you are lucky enough to be in the right management role, salaries are 10% - 15% higher than local competitors.  Employees are rarely fired which, depending on your viewpoint, can be good or bad.  Unfortunately, it has led to a mentality that "OK is Good Enough" since I will never advance but will never be fired.

On the positive side, the company boasts a collaborative work environment where team members are encouraged to share ideas and help each other. There's a sense of camaraderie that makes the day-to-day tasks more enjoyable. Management is generally approachabe.
The company offers a competitive benefits package that includes health insurance, a 401(k) match, and a decent amount of vacation time.
There are areas that could use improvement. Career advancement opportunities seem limited for those not in certain departments, and there's a noticeable lack of transparency regarding promotion paths.
While the workload is manageable most of the time, more and more people that leave are not replaced and work is dispearsed amongst those still here. Work-life balance is touted as a company value, but it doesn't always feel prioritized in practice.
Communication from upper management about company changes and decisions can sometimes be delayed or unclear, which can be frustrating for employees who desire to be in the loop and understand how their work contributes to the company's bigger picture

Current supervisors are worthless. 3 1/2 machines to tend to and cannot/will not keep up with their own work. Maitanance supervisor/lead is not knowledgable enough in management or maitanance to get equipment back up to par. Pay is extremely low to the average in SC. Upper management is trying to straighten place out. I give props on this, the rest of the supervisors need to be out the door also. You need younger people running this place now in order for it to succeed. Older employees have bad attitude and don't care one way or the other what happens and who they abuse. This is a small facility with a lot of back stabbers. People get promoted to easy into positions when they could not perform the jobs they once had. I know it's not apart of the culture to get rid of people but this building will not succeed with current supervisors/ lead people in the positions they hold due to not caring about the jobs they have. This is coming from a person that has supervised in numerous manufacturing facilities with proven numbers both production and maitanance

Lacks enterprises is a terrible place to work. The upper management says they cant give worker raises but then turns around and puts in a band new 1.5 million dollar robot, that they didnt need.  Management is a complete joke and only in forces the rules on a select few. The rules dont apply to the office personnel. I was told i couldnt leave my machine to go to the bathroom and go to the bathroom on my own time. The company will overwork for no reason. If you think you can move up the ladder in the company , think again cause they always have someone better for the spot that knows the lacks family or is bestfriends with someone in corporates upper management. The company has alot of hardworking floor workers that come from all parts of the world. Alot of those same floor workers get mistreated or talked to like they stupid. A painters job is really hazardous cause the process techs refuse to change out the air filters thus resulting in the painters having to breathe in paint fumes for 10 to 12 hours a day. Stay away from this company at all costs 

I was first at an assembly plant that had amazing team leads and supervisors. But when it came to HR, your needs do not matter. I was at that specific plant for almost 8 months, I was pregnant and during the pandemic they sent away all lower seniority. But what I sought out to be unfair was they kept a few people with lower seniority. So here I was pregnant being sent to a paint plant. I was trained in a few different positions at the previous plant I was at and was transferred to a lower position. I reached out to both HR at both plants along with plant managers about the smell of the paint while being pregnant and how awful it was. I was also high risk and told management and even had a doctors note to take certain amount of breaks and they ignored the note which led to me getting sick about 4 times a day and ended up in the hospital for IV fluids 3 times in just my first 13 weeks of being pregnant. They had no sympathy. I reached out to all of them multiple times it was sad. The assembly plant I was at had some people I considered family and they were always so helpful, just the higher management did not care about you or your needs.

They like to hire friends and family for upper level management, so no room to really advance there. Love the work greatly, and thankful for the overtime, but my supervisors are very picky with everything and they really like to hound on you. Went to HR about a few things about six months back and the result was nothing. My coworkers on my shift can be really awful and I've even gone to higher up than in my plant and nothing had been done. If somebody has worked there for a long period of time, they're untouchable. My supervisor doesn't seem to care about her job nor her workers. Very gossipy people in higher up which I find to be rather unfortunate. Overall it's not a bad place to start but don't expect to advance in this company unless you're the supervisors pet and a goody two shoes, even then, you probably won't advance up without some sort of friendship or relation to anybody in the company. 

backstabbing supervisors. filed a harrasment complaint with my imediate supervisor about another one just to get fired a week later. supervisor in question would talk to their employees like dogs and kids creating hostile work environment, also had issues with trash talking their employees to other employees. the culture the big dogs were trying to push for is a good one, only reason for 3 stars. machines were not kept up with, lots of oil and debris in floors creating safety issues. interview with upper management consisted of them saying they have ran like this for years and did not need anymore ideas about how to operate facility. lacked all needed principles to really thrive and run efficiently.

Was a very rewarding job. Some people were very well but then others could be difficult to work with as could be at any place. I had a lot of automotive experience before Lacks. I miss working there and I truly need a part time job to full fill my time and retirement needs. Co workers were many nationalities and cultures and some very friendly like in many situations today. There was no hard part of the job Just Fast Paced and at some time in a persons life you have to change the pace and let someone move in and you have to find a slower pace easy type job, which is not a bad deal all the way you look at it and you still can be very helpful and productive person for an employer just at a different level. I liked the type of work, the wages and the benefits, I really miss the extra wage money overall.

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Manufacturing specialist 28 salaries reported	$13.86 per hour
Packer 1 salary reported	$14.50 per hour
Supply chain analyst 3 salaries reported	$50,667 per year
Assistant engineer 3 salaries reported	$56,000 per year
Truck driver 1 salary reported	$35,000 per year

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