kitchen team member

customer service representative

kitchen leader

assistant general manager

service leader

Tokyo Joes

If you're a seasoned leader hoping to grow your career, Tokyo Joe’s will test your patience and your optimism. On the surface, the brand promises a culture of clean eating and streamlined operations. What you actually get is high-volume chaos masked by vague slogans and an unrelenting pace that breaks even the best.

Management here means being the duct tape that holds a sinking ship together. Training is virtually nonexistent—unless you count watching outdated videos while the store drowns in tickets. Corporate expects polished performance with zero structural support. You're given accountability but not authority. You’ll inherit broken systems, understaffed shifts, and unrealistic labor goals designed to fail.

Want to motivate your crew? Good luck. Morale is perpetually low due to turnover, subpar pay, and a lack of respect for frontline teams. The culture leans heavily on forced positivity while ignoring actual feedback. Upper management cycles through buzzwords like “growth mindset” and “operational excellence” without investing in tools or talent to back it up. Promotions are arbitrary, often favoring compliance over capability.

You’ll manage inventory, people, guest relations, and prep—but don't expect compensation that reflects those responsibilities. Bonus structures are unclear at best and disappear when margins dip. Benefits are minimal, and HR is rarely reachable unless you're in crisis.

If you're a proactive manager who thrives on developing teams, streamlining workflows, and building culture, this job will feel like a masterclass in spinning wheels. You’re not leading—you’re surviving.

Bottom line: Tokyo Joe’s demands the most and offers the least. It’s a fast-track to burnout in an environment where good leadership is stifled rather than cultivated. Think twice before committing your energy, your standards, and your reputation to a system that’s built for churn, not for change.

Now let me be specific, only at the 120th Huron Branch in Westminster gets all the action. This location is always really busy and I often feel stressed out. I can keep up but it’s bad for my anxiety, if you have any anxiety of any sort stay away from this job! However I am very fairly compensated for my efforts, not to mention the meals I can get every shift, that’s right, meals per shift! But all in all, it’s just getting to stressful for me and it’s interfering with my school so I’m looking to move on. Be ware of the hours, they are often long and they feel even longer despite the fast pace of work you do. The stress is real, especially for the person on sushi or on window (person who takes all the orders, bags em up or take em out to customers) this person, me, is taking fire from all sides of the work force. You get food from kitchen and food from sushi while making sure everything is correct in the bag you have to get it out as fast and efficiently as possible otherwise you’ll slow down the whole store. It’s rigorous, there are times I’m so busy that my shoe will come undone at 4:00 pm and I won’t get to tie it till 8:30pm. Oh don’t get me started on late night customers, they always come any day, any time, any weather conditions. Look if you like a fast pace environment, this job is for you. It’s has its benefits it has its downfalls, it’s up to you to decide.

The job itself isn't too bad. Not quite as much as a full service restaraunt but more difficult than most fast casual. 

The problems start with a toxic culture that encourages cliques and undermines people outside of them. The GM nitpicks constantly in a very rude way. My mistakes are treated as the end of the world while theirs are laughed off. They would get high on the job, play on their phone, and duck customers but if I forgot to bring a side of sauce to a table I would get yelled at in front of customers.

They texted all of us in a group chat nearly every day with passive aggresive and unprofessional comments. They often picked on people personally in these chats in front of everybody.

I have also seen our GM start full shouting matches with my team over personal issues that should have stayed with HR. Wildly unprofessional and verbally abusive comments you could here from the kitchenI've seen nearly the entire team driven to quit over about a year. 

When management isn't there the job is actually pretty fun! I would say work here at your own risk and don't engage in the drama if you can help it.

Working at Tokyo Joes was a good experience it pushed me outside my social comfort zones. A lot of the staff was great my issue was corporate did not care as much for employees as they did hitting the right numbers. There is a good portion of drama. Corporate again did not handle situations in a professional manor they acted like high schoolers. There was also countless occasions of pay being cut which makes me question their honesty about hours and pay to the employees. There was endless company changes making it difficult as an employee to keep up with the endless changes it was annoying. Many great managers within the company but strong issues within the corporate management level there was never any good feed back. The company also circulates man power quiet often which in theory is a good idea but poorly executed. They used it as a tool oh if you change location you will get promoted. If you did not change locations they made scheduling a pain and generally acted unfair to force you to do what they want.

When I started at Tokyo Joes, there was so much to love, yet after working here for 5+ years, I can say with confidence that I absolutely hate my job. As I look past the last few years, I will miss absolutely nothing about this company but my coworkers (discluding any district managers and corporate members obviously). It should be said that Tokyo Joes is very good to their customers yet this is at the complete expense of their employees. Customers walk all over and abuse the employees but the district managers reinforce this behavior with rewards for those who complain. It is no wonder that good employees are dropping like flies. On top of this, this disgusting company continues to seek out cheaper products while continuing to raise their prices and giving the employees yet another reason to be screamed at. A bowl costs them less than 2$ to make, try explaining that. Beyond this, employee morale is completely gone based on these reasons including that our company Christmas party was morphed into a dinner for only general managers and a 15$ Sheet cake for all other employees. If you're considering working here, do yourself a favor and find something better.

The best part of my job at Tokyo Joes has always been the people I work with. The employee base is amazing and you are guarunteed to make some life-long friends. The work environment is great because of the laid-back atmosphere. The hardest part of the job is the high-volume lunches and dinners which can be very stressful if you don't work well under pressure. However these high-pressure situations also teach you great teamwork skills as well as time management, organization and customer service skills. There is always opportunity for growth and as you move up you get leadership skills which I have found to be extremely valuable. I personally have always had a great experience with management within the stores; however higher management at a corporate level sometimes can make questionable decisions that seem more practical on paper than when they are actually applied in a restaurant. Overall working at Joe's has been a great experience for me and has given me career skills that i will be able to take with me on to other jobs in the future.

Tokyo Joes had many management issues. There was a lack of training and hardly any structure to its supervisors. They replaced the manager multiple times, which created an even less structured environment and allowed me to learn many skills outside of my job range for unequal pay. Disciplinary action was minimal and made the work environment stressful on those willing to put in their hundred percent. Tokyo Joe's ordering service, Shamrock, gave poor service with inadequate products, failed to ship certain items, and occasionally damaged received items. Phone line, internet, and card processing systems had many connection issues, and with no technical support, it was sometimes a daily struggle of  trying to fix the issues.

A typical day at Tokyo Joe's is easygoing, lax and fun in a good store, but stressful, tiresome and tense in a bad store. You will learn great time management skills here, as time management is the name of the game in Joe's or any fast food store. Often, people are cross trained so hours can be provided both fairly and competitively. This generally means if you need a break, someone CAN cover your station. The people are accepting of an odd personality and hair, piercings, beards or tattoos, and opinions can be discussed freely. The hardest part of the job is teamwork, as starting out it can be hard to know what it is you need to have stocked, but after some time it isn't too hard to figure out. The most enjoyable part of the job is the fun and friendly environment between team members, as friendships are not frowned upon.

Calling off is similar to prying off your own fingernails in terms of ease and experience.

I was with Tokyo Joe's for 2 years. The first year and a half, I had a great mentor who would teach me anything I wanted to know to help me meet my own goals within the company. However, upon the opening of the new store, my general manager left, and I stayed at the store, stuck with a new GM who had no idea how to lead a store, let alone the people who were loyal to the company. The store soon became a revolving door for new hires and no one seemed happy anymore. Multiple people requested transfer to other stores to get away from her, and when she would not approve them, she would fear monger the employees to either deal with her horrible attitude and work ethic, or leave the company. Which is what I did. I am better for it, now and about to be opening my own store with a different company who already acknowledges my capabilities and experience.

I worked as a sushi chef as well as front of house staff. The food was amazing, the customers were so great, and the overall environment was great. The only problem was the rude managers. They were very rude to me and treated me very differently from the other female coworkers, who were much more attractive than I. Others called in sick way more often than me, and were never punished. I called in for an emergency and my hours were cut. They also lied to me about being hired full time and did not keep their word on my full time hours. My GM also was having se*ual relations with a coworker of mine. He made it clear in front of all of us that he was indeed having an inappropriate with her. She was allowed as many breaks as she wanted, while i was often not given a lunch break during my 8 hour shifts.

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