4 ms·
> There is no customer facing service aspect, and very little quality difference between employees. What quality concerns there are can probably be traced back
by csdreamer7 9y ago
> There is no customer facing service aspect, and very little quality difference between employees. What quality concerns there are can probably be traced back to an individual employee very easily; returns due to poor packaging or wrong item can easily be pinned on the culprit.
I disagree; a counter argument would be Costco. Almost all of Costco has very little service interaction with their union employees. They have warehouses, distribution, and procurement that has little consumer interaction. It is difficult to find people to point what is what in aisle numbers and the lines in checkout can be very long. As far as I know all of the people who work in these facilities are union and they pay living wages and benefits.
The nice service workers who handle out free samples are contractors, not union employees the last time I checked.
- lotsofpulp 9y agoI can't find any source that says Costco employees are in a union. It seems that a portion of them are, but the vast majority are not in any union: https://teamster.org/content/costco-workers-stand-together https://teamster.org/content/costco-workers-stand-together
- red_phone 9y agoAs of two years ago, less than 8% of Costco’s workforce was unionized. (Source: https://www.reuters.com/article/costco-wholesale-teamsters/update-1-costco-changes-stance-on-pension-teamsters-recommends-new-contract-idUSL3N17M4DM https://www.reuters.com/article/costco-wholesale-teamsters/u...)
- abritinthebay 9y agoLast time I heard that figure it had been asked why they weren’t and most replied they didn’t see a need - the company treats them well enough already.
- triplesec 9y agoWhich could easily be due to a kind of Stockholm syndrome
- workthrowaway27 9y agoCostco is known to be a pretty good employer.
- abritinthebay 9y agoHmmm but that trend would likely hold true across the US, unless you think Costco has some specific brain-washing process :)
- yalph 9y agoBut as far as I know Costco is on the top ( or close ) of the list when it comes to employee happiness.
- bluedino 9y agoRight, but you can't just switch business models and expect things to keep running. Sam's club couldn't just crank the pay of everyone and expect to remain profitable.