We were pretty much understaffed almost all the time. The store at this location is pretty big, and when I started working here they typically had both registers on each side of the store open. I guess they lost a lot of money due to all the shoplifting that we got, so they only keep one register open now and only one fitting room open. The store gets really busy, and due to our hours being cut so much, there would be only 4 employees total during the morning into the afternoon. Lately, they've been scheduling less than 10 employees for closing shifts, it would generally be 6-8 people because there would always be one or two call outs. They'll hire all these people just to have their hours cut, it makes no sense. They sure do like to waste the payroll for management. One of the managers there will take all the overtime for herself.
As you could imagine, customers constantly complained about waiting in line for the fitting room and for the registers, and I don't blame them. The way they run this store is ridiculous, I don't know how they've stayed in business for this long. We are not allowed to open another fitting room unless there were more than 5 customers in line. Our main fitting room did not have enough rooms available most of the time, so for my entire shift, I would have to open the other fitting room 4 or 5 times. And they would not let us keep it open, once it slowed down, they'd make us close the second fitting room. It just isn't efficient. They waste time tha
1.0
Assistant Sales Manager | Hudson, NY | Apr 29, 2014
The job on the surface was very fun, cool clothes, nice people for the most part but the upper management styles are in need of a major overhall. I was an ASM a Hudson Valley location for almost seven months. I excelled at LP and trained the staff on various performance issues. The biggest downfall was the checks and balances of the store manager employed. She had admitted to the whole store that her and the DM had lived together, were 'besties', in each others weddings, went on vacation with each other and she presented it to the staff in a way of, 'If you guys try to complain about me, my best friend will tell me who it was so if you want to keep your job, you need to learn to kiss my butt to my satisfaction.' She was obsessed with calling herself the 'Store Manager'. She would tell employees that have worked there for years, You need to listen to me because I'm the STORE MANAGER. The SM started to become irritated with my work ethic of keeping the business needs ahead of personal gain, the opposite of how she worked. I reached out to HR after a letter she wrote to the whole store as if she was Mrs. Forever 21, stating that she thinks people were snooping in her files and explaining that if anyone was dissatisfied about their schedule to remember their place and that the STORE MANAGER will not tolerate any discussion on the matter. (The SM schedule was made by SMs and approved by DMs, see the fairness in this particular situation?) She put on the bottom of the document (tha
ProsMostly nice people, hard workers, great music to listen to
Typical day at work included recovery of sales floor, counting deposits and petty cash, ringing up customer purchases, possible projects from accessories manager and/or visual team. Also, I did training and job shadowing regarding shipment, fitting room and register procedures.
Overall, I learned a lot about how a retail business works and was given opportunity to display leadership through the training of employees. I worked here while juggling a full-time school schedule as a college student and research lab assistant at my university and the company was very flexible regarding my changing availability. I started off as a sales associate making more than minimum wage and was promoted to a head cashier position where I consistently worked 30+ hours/week, which was good money for someone working in retail part-time.
At the same time, I also saw the negative effects of bad employee morale, bad management and do-nothing people in corporate.
I was told that I was not good enough to be a manager. Despite the fact that the majority of management in this location regularly showed up late, left the training of employees to cashiers and sales associates (like myself), hired their friends, displayed poor communication to employees and showed rampant favoritism.
Management in this location is (mostly) unprofessional. The best managers I had in this location are either routinely given the worst working conditions or leave due to problems with the current store manager
When i started it was crazy cause we just opened that year, it was crazy busy but fun cause everyone worked as a team even though people came and went. the manager knew what they were doing at the time. Now a days its not fun, everything is drama drama drama espeically when someone started working about last year i think, she is a two face one day is likes you the other she hates you, you pretty much have to do what she saids or she will hate you and not speak to you even thought your doing a good job if you dont go out with her i mean out side of work she doesnt like you and shes always on her phone either on twitter, facebook, or calling her man, she doesnt care for the company polices,shes rude to customers like talks back at them, there is more. my visual boss was amazing until she changed and pretty much didnt do anything, she doesnt stand up for her team knowing that we wouldnt do like just stand around or do nothing. she acused me of filling wrong thats when i had enough cause knowing how she is i know she likes everything perfect and i do my best fill right i know focal fixtures has to be at stander but if the room is full i do put more clothes on to the non focal fixtures but never the focal, store is huge plus most of the time we cant fill cause the room is too packed and customer complain that the store is to full its hard to shop i dont disagree with them its true, thats why i put in my two weeks in i had enough but then when i came back to work they fired me for
Working at Forever21 was interesting. It’s a job where if you get pushed around easily and you don’t mind it, it’d be great for you. But if you are a normal person then I do not recommend it in the slightest.
Pros:
•The pay in my area for what I was doing seemed fair. Granted the hours I was working were not.
•If you are in visual like I was, you usually get off early.
•Because you work with putting new clothes away you get first dibs on new items.
Cons:
•You are just another worker to them, they don’t care about you.
•High expectations, but NO TRAINING. They expect you to know how to do everything after being shown once, but if you don’t do it right they “punish” you by cutting hours.
•Management was a joke. It was a catty, drama filled, Starbucks guzzling joke.
•As visual you work your butt off for the whole shift, but normal sales associates and management get to be paid for playing on their phones, chatting, and making Starbucks runs MULTIPLE times a day.
•Labor intense work. Constantly lifting boxes and mannequins which are heavy especially when it’s repeated movements.
•When I was visual we had to get to work obnoxiously early. I’m talking 5-6 AM. The earliest I ever had to go in was 4 IN THE MORNING.
•Upper management (DistrictM, RegionalM) was ridiculous. They would tell you to switch up sections in the store by swapping them completely within near impossible time schedules. Like before opening they expected you to completely switch the bigg
ProsFair pay, first dibs on clothes
ConsShort breaks, terrible discount, catty management, lazy management, pushy sales, high expectations, early hours, late hours, rude customers
On a daily basis as a production coordinator at Forever21 consists of many duties. I am in contact with 5 vendors that are located across seas who we place a certain amount of orders per season. We are keeping track of approximately 3-4 seasons at a time. As a production coordinator, I am responsible to keep track of each order/style from the colors and fabric qualities coming in correctly, which I review with our team designer to making sure that the garments are fitting as we had envisioned when we first create the style. If any issues with meeting the set in-house date or other situations such as shipment coming in incorrectly, I would report to my upper-manager to discuss the best solution.
I have learned many valuable qualities working at Forever21 Corporate. First off, as a production coordinator, I have learned to prioritize my tasks throughout the day because there are several vendors I need to keep track with their work flow and making sure I am relaying any information in a timely manner. I have learned how to handle different fabric qualities as far as knowing a standard of what is considered acceptable and what is poor quality. I have also learned time management is crucial in this job because everything is considered urgent. Because there is always a sense of urgency, I have learned to not be overwhelmed and to stay organized to get all the tasks I need to finish in a 9 hour day.
Management is one of the most difficult parts about this job. I have learned
Unless you enjoy demoralization at all times, DO NOT work here.
I took this job in the fall of 2010, and I truly hope it has changed.
A typical day begins with showing up and clocking in. Then you go meet with whoever is deemed in charge for the day. Normally they have a clipboard telling them where you will be thrown. But you won't be allowed to enter the sales floor until you are inspected; which entails someone to judge whether or not your attire is fashionable and determines whether you have any electronics on you. There is no excuse for having a cell phone on you, its a write up and an early day if its even on you, doesn't matter if its silenced or off; indeed, doesn't matter if your brother/sister/mother/father/husband/wife/etc is hospitalized and you have to have your phone on you to receive word. After that whole practice, you go out to the sales floor or to your cashier station. On the way there, you get told to do 10 different things by 5 different people. You do your job right or you do your job wrong, it doesnt matter because the merchandising associates, the people who are only a step above the lowest of the low (floor associates) will harass you. Harrassment is not only commonly practiced by the upper echelons; it goes unpunished and is occasionally encouraged.You go about your day until your ten minute break comes along. You go to the employee lounge and endure things like racist jokes, religionist jokes, just conversation that is both not workplace friendly and borderline illegal in my state. And a Forever 21 employee take
The things I witnessed and heard about in my short time with this location are enough that that location should be shut down. Firstly, the store was a major safety hazard. There was no equipment for the stock team to safely perform their job. There were shipment boxes piled high in the fitting room, stock room, and the sales floor. Customers frequently asked if the store was closing because of the hundreds of boxes on the sales floor. The schedule was horrible and was always posted at the last minute, and then regularly had to be altered after that. Employees, including management, would call out or no call no show, or come in late, or leave early whenever they felt like it with no repercussions. There was blatant favoritism. Employees were never given handbooks (I specifically requested one when I started and had to receive it from a different location than the one I worked at) and therefore did not know their rights. Associates were disrespected and talked down to on a daily basis. The break room was a disaster. In the break room, they also kept all the trash (piled high and taking up half the space), as well as visual supplies (mannequins, fixture equipment etc), and the room was just dusty and dirty and grimey. The employee bathrooms hardly ever have toilet paper, or paper towels. There were times there weren’t even gloves to take the trash out. Employees were constantly threatened with the words “big brother is watching” (meaning corporate is watching the cameras). If bi
Great way to express your fashion sense and great for students who need work
I worked for this company back in 2012 for only 6 months while I was still going to college. I would drive about 30 minutes from my home to work since the store I worked at was in a different city that wasn’t too far from where I lived. I worked about 3 times a week on days I didn’t have school. Pretty much all of my shifts were 4 hours long with occasional 6 hours shifts scheduled here and there. On a very rare occasion would I get scheduled an 8 hour shift. I only worked the sales floor greeting customers and offering shopping bags for an easier shopping experience. I would grab my go backs from the fitting rooms and proceed to work them out in my assigned area or the store. I would constantly zone my areas throughout my shift so that nothing was on the floor and the fixtures were easy to look through and shop for customers. Occasionally I would get asked by customers to help find specific articles of clothing that they had seen on our website prior to coming in to the physical store. I never worked the fitting room or was a cashier and never got offered to train in those areas. I did work receiving one day and that was only because we came in for an overnight shift to do markdowns and there wasn’t enough working scanners available to use. For the most part I would work opening shifts and at least once a week I would have a closing shift. My closing shifts would be scheduled for 5 hours but we would actually stay two to three hours longer some nights depending on how bad t
ProsAble to express yourself through fashion and flexible schedule
ConsNot getting paid appropriately when doing OT, management wasn't on you telling you when to take a break or lunch, communication wasn't so great
The company is okay. I had an awful experience working here just because of the people I worked with but I'll try to keep that out of the actual job review. This company is great for anyone looking to pursue visual merchandising. Not only is there plenty of job openings for it because of how big Forever 21 stores are, but they give you so much freedom and really let you be creative with merchandising outfits, mannequins, walls, etc. They are very open with dress code as well. You can wear whatever you want except if it has large brand names on it and even then they don't care too much. However, the actual company is very cheap. Everyone including management gets 10% employee discount.. Which by the way is the exact same discount for customers if they have a damaged item or a complaint or anything really. A lot of people make the argument, "well all the stuff is really cheap" which is true but most people work retail for the discounts. Don't waste your time or money. They don't provide any incentive to make you want to stay so the turn over rate for this company is ridiculous especially for associates. Don't even get me started on the return policy and how many times I've had to deal with an upset customer and try to figure out a way to bring them back into the store and continue business with us. They are very flexible with your schedule and availability because they have so many people that can work so that's a plus. I really did like that I didn't have to work weekends if
ProsMerchandising creativity, flexible work schedules
ConsCheap company, associate turn over rate too high, unrealistic expectations, low pay, no benefits, 10% discount
It's a really fun place to work at if most of the associates are around the same age group as you or you generally just enjoy their company. However, some managers have poor essential skills when conducting their employees and tend to miscommunicate. For starters, most of the racks are stuffed to the point where customers cannot even shop and the employees are yet to blame if their section is messy. Where I worked in the last couple months there, I was constantly given 0 hours per week, tried to pick up shifts but the manager would disapprove with the reason being, "I don't do my job right". Some of them think you're being lazy when you're the most productive person on the floor that day which leads to deep discouragement and amotivation. Some of the managers would also just walk around the store 'supervising' when they are just either bored or try to catch someone for talking to a fellow coworker. There is a difference between criticism and straight insults, there have also been accounts of discrimination, misjudgment of character, and a sense of very high superiority complex from some managers when it's simply a retail store, and not a parliament house. Most of the time, they have a playlist of about 20 songs that are on constant repeat throughout the day, week, month and year, which could potentially make someone question their purpose in entirety in that store as it can really dig deep into your nerves. With a management and a music playlist like this, customers are not e
ProsGood hours sometimes
ConsPoor management
Questions And Answers about Forever 21
How often do you get a raise at Forever 21?
Asked Oct 28, 2020
Only if the minimum was raised
Answered Jan 28, 2023
Once a year’s
Answered Jan 26, 2023
What is the promotion process like at Forever 21?
Asked Oct 10, 2020
Horrible
Answered Jan 26, 2023
There isn't really a promotion process.
Answered Jan 24, 2023
What is the best part of working at Forever 21?
Asked Oct 12, 2019
Putting in your two weeks notice
Answered Jan 19, 2023
The best part about working at forever 21 was the new people I met.
Answered Jul 3, 2022
What is a typical day like for you at Forever 21?
Asked Mar 19, 2020
stressful
Answered Jan 23, 2023
Short and underwhelming.
Answered Jan 22, 2023
What benefits does Forever 21 offer?
Asked Jan 23, 2018
Only for full timers
Answered Jan 25, 2023
None to "part timers" (37 and a half hours a week. 8 hour shifts meals un payed)
