sales associate

shift manager

warehouse associate

seasonal associate

assistant store manager

Newbury Comics

Part-time work can be fun if you luck into a store without any major festering interpersonal drama (a 50/50 chance at best), but the pay bump you receive with promotions is hardly proportional with the workload. Each store is essentially an island largely cut off from the chain at large, higher-ups only swing by when convenient to micromanage you but disappear whenever you need them. 

The company can't decide if it wants to be a handful of cool indie shops or a reliable fastidious chain, they swap at random from making mountains of molehills and letting major problems slide, so you never know which rules are expected to be enforced heavily or when. Promotions come quick up to the level of store manager, due to extremely high employee turn-around (eventually every keyholder and manager realizes they could get paid more for less stress elsewhere), but manager is a dead end, there's only a handful of people above you and they're holding those jobs in a vice grip, and reaching those positions gives most of them a major chip on their shoulder. PTO is the bare minimum, annual bonuses are a joke, and the company likes to pretend it's staying "competitive" by offering pennies more than bare minimum. Managers make what assistants would in equivalent companies.

My advice: get the job for a holiday, make some friends, enjoy the discount, and get out. Everyone who stays more than a year ends up quitting full of resentment or fired over a minor offense anyway.

Newbury Comics isn't a terrible place to work, in fact it's definitely one of the better in terms of "trend stores".

Moving up hasn't been particularly difficult, however it really depends upon your store whether or not you feel you're actually being given the responsibilities of your position that you expect. It can be frustrating and burnout inducing, especially when you reach higher positions within a store and feel as if you're being given crumbs in terms of job expectations.

Even when you do feel you're fulfilling your role, don't expect your vision to be totally realized or accepted. Often times staff expectations or specific habits/routines we train staff on seem to just change or be dropped without warning. Communication between the rest of the managers is poor and never consistent. It can make helping grow a positive environment for employees to succeed extremely difficult and a lack of precedent for handling poor effort or behavior definitely wears on the staff and nothing is done from those above you to curb it despite protest.

The job as a whole though is not awful, in fact it is extremely fun at its core. I've met life long friends through working for Newbury and made many network connections through different industries. It's a fun place with a lot to offer. But managers definitely need to put forth a more team forward mentality and need to be very on top of incentivizing their staff and making them feel included.

The usual weekday at Newbury Comics can typically be slow and uneventful, though the weekends will certainly bring a lot of foot traffic. One thing remains the same on any day though - the fellow employees and the customers you meet will keep the job entertaining. The atmosphere of the store is very cool on top of that, so being in there for several hours a day doesn't feel mind-numbing. Schedules can be flexible and the managers (at this location, at least) were very courteous when it came to said flexibility. The only downsides to this job I could think of are the low pay and the difficulty to land a sales position with the company outside of the seasonal period. The seasonal period only offered $15.50/hour, and I'm not sure what a part-time or full-time employee makes but I've had that it's similarly inadequate. I suppose it makes a little sense due to the small amount of typical foot traffic, but like any other retail job there is a lot that goes into the position, so a higher pay is certainly in order. As far as a place to get some retail experience goes, this is the right place, just not if you need to rely on these wages to make a living.

I worked at three different Newbury Comics locations over the course of 4 years. I loved my job until I got into management. The responsibilities and expectations for your role are super high without enough compensation. As an assistant manager, I was making only $3 more than the seasonal employees I hired. The higher up in the company I got, the more drama was revealed to me. I had several complaints I brought to higher management about certain coworkers that were swept under the rug and ignored. Managers are not held accountable for the way they treat their staff as all the company cares about is making money and if a manager makes it seem like their store is producing enough profit than they're essentially given free reign to run things how they prefer, which could be a good thing but went very badly in my experience.

This is a good entry-level job (fun with a great discount and starting pay), but don't get your hopes up for any job advancement here.

Working for Newbury Comics has been a learning experience. I've learned a lot about sales, customer service, merchandising and what customers expect and want from a store like it. The company has it's fair share of problems though. I've worked under managers who have brought their personal problems into the work environment thus affecting employee morale and work ethic. The company itself has branding issues and sells product that just barely reflects the culture we are living in. For example there are a couple of sections in the store dedicated to t-shirts, one being a music t-shirt section. What you'll find is a section almost entirely comprised of 70s and 80s rock bands. It makes sense to have these in the store but there are no hip-hop or pop t-shirts, two genres that are currently dominating our culture. The most enjoyable part of working at Newbury Comics is interacting with customers and getting to talk about our products, which are all things that I love. The hardest part has been working under the managers my store has had and the unprofessional environment they've created.

I've been with this company for more than half a decade, across 5 stores, and it has changed drastically in the last few months. With the shortage of employees, starting wages have increased. However, that increase didn't happen as drastically for anyone who's higher than an associate and/or been with the company for a long time. 
The warehouse and main office have exactly zero idea of what it's like to actually work and deal with the public on the in-store level. We're getting more tasks with less time and fewer people to do them every week. 
It's a shame, because I used to love the job. My coworkers and management were the best I've ever worked with. I felt proud whenever I got a task done. I used to feel like I was working towards something. 
Not anymore. The company lost its soul, and I lost my eagerness for it 

I always thought working at Newbury Comics would be so cool, and fun - as most of the stores I've shopped in have that vibe. Not the case at the location I was at; I was forced to basically harass customers about sales, getting their emails and over-greeting, I had to write essays on how to improve the store's sales (on my own time, with no reward), I was given 10 hours or less sometimes a week for a part-time job! The hours never exceeded 15, and at that they made me feel like I should praise them for it! Some days I worked 3 hour shifts alphabetizing dvds and cds the entire shift. I was there for a while and nothing ever got better, I felt like I was walking on egg shells the entire time trying to keep the over-critical managers pleased. Since being in other stores it's clear to me that it was just that specific location, at least I think. The discount was the best perk. Also lots of gossip among fellow workers.

My time at Newbury Comics was unfortunately very negative. I often felt singled out and treated differently, especially because of my age and because I didn’t fit in with the workplace culture. Instead of feeling supported or included, I frequently felt dismissed and talked down to, which created a hostile and uncomfortable environment.

There were also moments where certain comments and behaviors came across as insensitive and inappropriate. Whether intentional or not, these interactions made me feel unwelcome and undervalued. I believe every workplace should strive to treat employees with respect, fairness, and professionalism, and I didn’t feel that standard was met here.

Overall, I hope the company takes steps to improve its communication, training, and approach to inclusivity so that future employees have a better experience than I did. Not to mention the manager is VERY rude.

I loved a lot of parts of my 7 years at this job but it's really not that feasible long term. The work is pretty easy, coworkers are super easygoing, I loved everyone i worked with, but the main office forces the stores to be understaffed and underpaid. It's incredibly difficult to get a meaningful raise, management positions are still wildly underpaid. There's been some major turnover in the higher-ups that have made communication between stores and the main office significantly more stunted and difficult. The high turnover rate at the warehouse leads to continuous mistakes that have to be fixed at the store level with no real sign of improvements from the warehouse. But as far as an entry level retail gig goes it's solid for a day to day fun job.

This was a terrible mistake, they are all childish and disrespectful adults who act like children.  They created a workplace environment that encourages one another to bully and exclude anyone they don’t agree with. Constantly being fake nice in your face to talk behind your back to everyone who’ll listen to them.  The upper management is terrible and fully believes in nepotism based on their actions. 

They even went as far as to contacting my new place of work to bad mouth me to my new employers. 

Overall terrible place filled with nonsensical toxic people who create their own narrative to exclude and manipulate the system in their favor. 

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Sales associate 1 salary reported	$15.25 per hour
Shift manager 5 salaries reported	$16.88 per hour
Warehouse associate 4 salaries reported	$17.88 per hour
Seasonal associate 1 salary reported	$15.25 per hour
Assistant store manager 2 salaries reported	$19.00 per hour

Working at Newbury Comics: Company Overview and Reviews

Newbury Comics

Newbury Comics Ratings

Popular jobs at Newbury Comics

Salary Satisfaction

Job Seeker Tools

Employer Tools

Browse

Stay Connected