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For those who aren't aware, not only does Costco pay well (I was earning $13/hour back around 2004), they also offer good benefits. I got healthcare, 401k, dent

For those who aren't aware, not only does Costco pay well (I was earning $13/hour back around 2004), they also offer good benefits. I got healthcare, 401k, dental, vision, and time and a half on Sundays. And I was just a food court/service deli employee. Things got even better when I became a food court supervisor. The mantra I heard, over and over, while I was there was "Hire good people, treat them well, and the rest takes care of itself."

duxup 7y ago
That's a pretty good quote. I'm always amazed by how many places cut corners on employee benefits and pay and then spend endless effort dealing with turnover and the results of poor employees.
- TheSpiceIsLife 7y ago
  My suspicion is, the people who make those decisions are themselves poor employees.
  - rbritton 7y ago
    It starts at the top or at the very least is looked over by the top. Every miserable work experience I’ve ever had was due to the culture passed down from the top. Likewise with every great place. Insecure, jealous, vindictive, <other negative adjective> people should never be promoted to manage others but often are when that’s easier than firing. Those types tend to shuffle around and work up the hierarchy by being miserable rather than competent.
- abarringer 7y ago
  I find that if you treat an employee like a race horse they won't turn out to be an old nag. Obviously there are outliers but generally there is a positive feedback loop.
- rchaud 7y ago
  The CEO signs off on a decision to cut benefits or other employee incentives, often as a short-term measure to cut costs and improve margins. The negative effects of that will be borne by the store managers and ultimately the customers. Excrement flows downhill.
tjr225 7y ago
The people I knew that worked there(in IT) said it was an absolute nightmare with low pay and poor management. That said, they aren't a tech company so...
- Pfhreak 7y ago
  That I would believe. I worked in the warehouse, not in headquarters. But the systems we used to look up and track inventory were basically terminals. Old school green and black terminals with arcane commands. I would absolutely believe that they don't want to try and compete with the tech sector for talent, and their management doesn't have the same understanding of tech that they do of running a warehouse business.
  - eej71 7y ago
    I bet those old school terminals are faster than what most corporate IT systems would deliver with an over the top modern framework. It's probably cheaper to train new employees than give away millions of dollars to an outside IT tech firm which may not result in an improvement.
- LilBytes 7y ago
  Costco might be fantastic to work for when you're front of house staff, but IT staff in the retail sector are nothing short of expendable. I lasted 9 months in my first and only retail job and the shocking standards that the company enforced. I've worked in IT for the retail sector and I'd never, ever do it again. I was a Dev/System Admin/System Engineer/DBA/Network Engineer & Help Desk person. I needed a job rather desperately and took the first one that was available to me which at initial view I thought was promising. As an example, if you worked on call which was restored 1 in 3 weeks, you didn't earn anything extra in wages on the days you were on call. But instead I earned 0.5 hours of TOIL for every hour that I was restored on which was from memory. 07:00-20: 00 Saturday, Sunday and Public Holidays. And 07:00 -> 09:00 and 18:00 - 20:00 Monday to Friday. I would get calls at all hours because we supported retail stores in New Zealand, Australia, US & Canada. We had local staff in those areas but for the gaps in follow the sun support we had the on call person fill that role. This might have been a good deal if you didn't get many calls. But for the larger part it was a full time day of work on Saturda, Sunday and Public Holiday when _no one was working_ except the on call person. And on an evening and first thing in the morning for shop close and open you frequently got calls before and after your shift started. All for 0.5 hours for every hour worked! This doesn't even begin to cover the problems we had with retaining staff (understandably) and an absolutely awful work environment. My manager did his best to foster a positive work environment but the C levels clearly had no desire to do anything but bleed their staff dry. Wrapping up my tirade, it wouldn't surprise me if this was the standard across the retail industry for IT staff and developers. Based on those I've spoken to outside of my own personal experience, this seems to be close to true. For all the glory that Costco holds for paying higher than average wages, I'm certain their IT department fucks over it's staff in a way that closely resembles my own.
alexpetralia 7y ago
This is obviously what any sensible and thoughtful manager aspires to, and yet it is still so rare. Are there tradeoffs we aren't considering? Why is this such a self-evident ideal, yet rarely achieved in practice? There must be good reasons..
- BurningFrog 7y ago
  There are only so many good people. Someone has to hire the bad people.
  - jay_kyburz 7y ago
    Nar, bad people need to change their ways until they are good people and employable. Unless they are _literately_ unemployable, in which case we should consider them disabled at look after them as if we would anybody else with metal or physical disabilities.
    - briandear 7y ago
      > Unless they are _literately_ unemployable, in which case we should consider them disabled at look after them as if we would anybody else with metal or physical disabilities. Why? People shouldn’t be rewarded for being disagreeable, unwilling to get along with people, and unwilling to work. If they are literally disabled and can’t work at all, that’s one thing. But even people with mental disabilities can be great employees. Rewarding anti-social behavior with “looking after” incentivizes such behavior. Subsidize behavior and you get more of it. Case in point, all of the fake disability people who have unverifiable soft tissue “injuries” that collect disability as a life choice.
      - bsanr2 7y ago
        You would rather have to work with people who have an incentive to behave badly (in order to get fired from jobs they didn't want in the first place), than to just give them enough to live on until they decide how they're going to contribute? Between the disabled and underemployed, there must be more than enough people to seriously jeopardize overall economic stability should destitution force them to action. And where is the role of the employer and the overall culture in fostering a work environment that isn't miserable?
mdorazio 7y ago
Serious question: are they also diligent about firing people who don't pull their weight? The mantra is fantastic, but my experience has been it gets taken advantage of pretty quickly if you don't have a feedback loop to make sure you really did hire good people.
- 0xTJ 7y ago
  This is just my personal experience, in Canada, but I've never encountered rude and unhelpful employees at Costco like I have at many other stores.
  - labster 7y ago
    In retail a store competes on price, selection, quality, service, and location. To me it’s astonishing that supermarkets have managed to yield the service advantage to Costco, a warehouse store. Half the staff is twice as helpful. And the quality advantage, and even parity on selection. And the grocery chains don’t know why they keep losing money in their race to the bottom.
- Pfhreak 7y ago
  Yes, though people generally recognized the good thing they had and worked hard to maintain it.
  - numpad0 7y ago
    Human diversity disallows even good-bad scale to align or converge well...there must be their secret sauce somewhere.
    - r00fus 7y ago
      ?
      - numpad0 7y ago
        Standards for “good things” eventually branches into factions with conflicting axes or criteria. Arbitrarily set and static point of reference can solve it e.g. a bible or a well though out system. I don’t think the former is the CostCo’s thing so I’m wondering what would be.
Reedx 7y ago
Costco and Trader Joes seem to consistently have the happiest employees, and it really makes a difference. Maybe we should have them take a shot at running the DMV, who have the most miserable.
- mav3rick 7y ago
  They are happy because the company treats them right. Give the DMV people the same rights and perks and you'd see them happy as well.
- dboreham 7y ago
  Data point: the DMV here in Montata is staffed by happy cheerful helpful employees.
  - dsfyu404ed 7y ago
    Quality of interactions with basically all government seems to correlate inversely with local population density.
    - MrMember 7y ago
      I had nothing but good experiences with the DMV when I lived in North Dakota. Walk in, no wait, cheerful employees, walk out ten minutes later with a renewed driver's license. Minnesota is the complete opposite. Walk in, wait an hour, every employee hates their job, then wait a month for the new license to come in the mail.
  - EdwardWarren 7y ago
    Are they unionized?
- demadog 7y ago
  Weird! I've found them to be completely opposite. Trader Joe's employees are extremely friendly and helpful. Costco employees, honestly, not helpful at all and almost always disdainful of being asked any question. I guess that's not their model. I suppose Costco employees can be happy with the company, but not happy and friendly to the customers, in which case, that holds up.
axaxs 7y ago
Absolutely. Same with chick fil a. They run a tight ship, but importantly, they are completely nice, much like Costco employees. And as long lines prove for both, there's an untapped market for this.
- bo0tzz 7y ago
  Unfortunately they do have some questionable morals on other fronts.
  - ctack 7y ago
    How so?
    - indigochill 7y ago
      The company culture derives from the founder's Southern Baptist background so sometimes they take unpopular political stances like opposing same-sex marriage. Some consider this as a moral failing rather than the other side of diversity.
      - wahern 7y ago
        If it wasn't "tainted" by its religious inception, mandatory Sunday closures would make Chick-fil-A the most progressive large service industry company in the United States from a labor welfare perspective. From a utilitarian perspective the human benefit, not to mention the unique example it sets, is incomparable to the company's [largely historical] anti-marriage equality political lobbying, especially considering that the company does not discriminate in its operations or hiring practices. (And AFAIK no credible accusation has ever been made in contradiction of that crucial fact.) It's sadly typical for social issue advocates across the spectrum to cut off their nose to spite their face in this manner.
        threatofrain 7y ago
        I mean you take the good with the bad, and it's on a chicken franchise to determine how interesting they think it is to have their progressive Sunday policy framed next to their stance that gay people shouldn't be able to marry.
dblohm7 7y ago
* Unless you’re a professional working at the pharmacy or hearing center. I’ve heard some pretty bad stories about those positions.
- RSHEPP 7y ago
  If you go on reddit pharmacy, you see people say Costco is by far the best retail pharmacy and almost impossible to get a full-time gig with.
exogeny 7y ago
This feels very similar yo Chick-Fil-A and In-N-Out and, well, the results are what they are.
- EdwardWarren 7y ago
  I heard from an In-N-Out employee that store managers make 6 figure salaries and there are two of them in each store. In-N-Out, Costco, and Chick-fil-a employees all seem to work really hard and are unfailingly good with customers. I had a problem in a Target once, talked to an employee about it and he went to 'check on it' and never came back. Just left me standing there.

duxup 7y ago

That's a pretty good quote. I'm always amazed by how many places cut corners on employee benefits and pay and then spend endless effort dealing with turnover and the results of poor employees.

TheSpiceIsLife 7y ago
My suspicion is, the people who make those decisions are themselves poor employees.
- rbritton 7y ago
  It starts at the top or at the very least is looked over by the top. Every miserable work experience I’ve ever had was due to the culture passed down from the top. Likewise with every great place. Insecure, jealous, vindictive, <other negative adjective> people should never be promoted to manage others but often are when that’s easier than firing. Those types tend to shuffle around and work up the hierarchy by being miserable rather than competent.
abarringer 7y ago
I find that if you treat an employee like a race horse they won't turn out to be an old nag. Obviously there are outliers but generally there is a positive feedback loop.
rchaud 7y ago
The CEO signs off on a decision to cut benefits or other employee incentives, often as a short-term measure to cut costs and improve margins. The negative effects of that will be borne by the store managers and ultimately the customers. Excrement flows downhill.

tjr225 7y ago

The people I knew that worked there(in IT) said it was an absolute nightmare with low pay and poor management. That said, they aren't a tech company so...

Pfhreak 7y ago
That I would believe. I worked in the warehouse, not in headquarters. But the systems we used to look up and track inventory were basically terminals. Old school green and black terminals with arcane commands. I would absolutely believe that they don't want to try and compete with the tech sector for talent, and their management doesn't have the same understanding of tech that they do of running a warehouse business.
- eej71 7y ago
  I bet those old school terminals are faster than what most corporate IT systems would deliver with an over the top modern framework. It's probably cheaper to train new employees than give away millions of dollars to an outside IT tech firm which may not result in an improvement.
LilBytes 7y ago
Costco might be fantastic to work for when you're front of house staff, but IT staff in the retail sector are nothing short of expendable. I lasted 9 months in my first and only retail job and the shocking standards that the company enforced. I've worked in IT for the retail sector and I'd never, ever do it again. I was a Dev/System Admin/System Engineer/DBA/Network Engineer & Help Desk person. I needed a job rather desperately and took the first one that was available to me which at initial view I thought was promising. As an example, if you worked on call which was restored 1 in 3 weeks, you didn't earn anything extra in wages on the days you were on call. But instead I earned 0.5 hours of TOIL for every hour that I was restored on which was from memory. 07:00-20: 00 Saturday, Sunday and Public Holidays. And 07:00 -> 09:00 and 18:00 - 20:00 Monday to Friday. I would get calls at all hours because we supported retail stores in New Zealand, Australia, US & Canada. We had local staff in those areas but for the gaps in follow the sun support we had the on call person fill that role. This might have been a good deal if you didn't get many calls. But for the larger part it was a full time day of work on Saturda, Sunday and Public Holiday when _no one was working_ except the on call person. And on an evening and first thing in the morning for shop close and open you frequently got calls before and after your shift started. All for 0.5 hours for every hour worked! This doesn't even begin to cover the problems we had with retaining staff (understandably) and an absolutely awful work environment. My manager did his best to foster a positive work environment but the C levels clearly had no desire to do anything but bleed their staff dry. Wrapping up my tirade, it wouldn't surprise me if this was the standard across the retail industry for IT staff and developers. Based on those I've spoken to outside of my own personal experience, this seems to be close to true. For all the glory that Costco holds for paying higher than average wages, I'm certain their IT department fucks over it's staff in a way that closely resembles my own.

alexpetralia 7y ago

This is obviously what any sensible and thoughtful manager aspires to, and yet it is still so rare. Are there tradeoffs we aren't considering? Why is this such a self-evident ideal, yet rarely achieved in practice? There must be good reasons..

BurningFrog 7y ago
There are only so many good people. Someone has to hire the bad people.
- jay_kyburz 7y ago
  Nar, bad people need to change their ways until they are good people and employable. Unless they are _literately_ unemployable, in which case we should consider them disabled at look after them as if we would anybody else with metal or physical disabilities.
  - briandear 7y ago
    > Unless they are _literately_ unemployable, in which case we should consider them disabled at look after them as if we would anybody else with metal or physical disabilities. Why? People shouldn’t be rewarded for being disagreeable, unwilling to get along with people, and unwilling to work. If they are literally disabled and can’t work at all, that’s one thing. But even people with mental disabilities can be great employees. Rewarding anti-social behavior with “looking after” incentivizes such behavior. Subsidize behavior and you get more of it. Case in point, all of the fake disability people who have unverifiable soft tissue “injuries” that collect disability as a life choice.
    - bsanr2 7y ago
      You would rather have to work with people who have an incentive to behave badly (in order to get fired from jobs they didn't want in the first place), than to just give them enough to live on until they decide how they're going to contribute? Between the disabled and underemployed, there must be more than enough people to seriously jeopardize overall economic stability should destitution force them to action. And where is the role of the employer and the overall culture in fostering a work environment that isn't miserable?

mdorazio 7y ago

Serious question: are they also diligent about firing people who don't pull their weight? The mantra is fantastic, but my experience has been it gets taken advantage of pretty quickly if you don't have a feedback loop to make sure you really did hire good people.

0xTJ 7y ago
This is just my personal experience, in Canada, but I've never encountered rude and unhelpful employees at Costco like I have at many other stores.
- labster 7y ago
  In retail a store competes on price, selection, quality, service, and location. To me it’s astonishing that supermarkets have managed to yield the service advantage to Costco, a warehouse store. Half the staff is twice as helpful. And the quality advantage, and even parity on selection. And the grocery chains don’t know why they keep losing money in their race to the bottom.
Pfhreak 7y ago
Yes, though people generally recognized the good thing they had and worked hard to maintain it.
- numpad0 7y ago
  Human diversity disallows even good-bad scale to align or converge well...there must be their secret sauce somewhere.
  - r00fus 7y ago
    ?
    - numpad0 7y ago
      Standards for “good things” eventually branches into factions with conflicting axes or criteria. Arbitrarily set and static point of reference can solve it e.g. a bible or a well though out system. I don’t think the former is the CostCo’s thing so I’m wondering what would be.

Reedx 7y ago

Costco and Trader Joes seem to consistently have the happiest employees, and it really makes a difference. Maybe we should have them take a shot at running the DMV, who have the most miserable.

mav3rick 7y ago
They are happy because the company treats them right. Give the DMV people the same rights and perks and you'd see them happy as well.
dboreham 7y ago
Data point: the DMV here in Montata is staffed by happy cheerful helpful employees.
- dsfyu404ed 7y ago
  Quality of interactions with basically all government seems to correlate inversely with local population density.
  - MrMember 7y ago
    I had nothing but good experiences with the DMV when I lived in North Dakota. Walk in, no wait, cheerful employees, walk out ten minutes later with a renewed driver's license. Minnesota is the complete opposite. Walk in, wait an hour, every employee hates their job, then wait a month for the new license to come in the mail.
- EdwardWarren 7y ago
  Are they unionized?
demadog 7y ago
Weird! I've found them to be completely opposite. Trader Joe's employees are extremely friendly and helpful. Costco employees, honestly, not helpful at all and almost always disdainful of being asked any question. I guess that's not their model. I suppose Costco employees can be happy with the company, but not happy and friendly to the customers, in which case, that holds up.

axaxs 7y ago

Absolutely. Same with chick fil a. They run a tight ship, but importantly, they are completely nice, much like Costco employees. And as long lines prove for both, there's an untapped market for this.

bo0tzz 7y ago
Unfortunately they do have some questionable morals on other fronts.
- ctack 7y ago
  How so?
  - indigochill 7y ago
    The company culture derives from the founder's Southern Baptist background so sometimes they take unpopular political stances like opposing same-sex marriage. Some consider this as a moral failing rather than the other side of diversity.
    - wahern 7y ago
      If it wasn't "tainted" by its religious inception, mandatory Sunday closures would make Chick-fil-A the most progressive large service industry company in the United States from a labor welfare perspective. From a utilitarian perspective the human benefit, not to mention the unique example it sets, is incomparable to the company's [largely historical] anti-marriage equality political lobbying, especially considering that the company does not discriminate in its operations or hiring practices. (And AFAIK no credible accusation has ever been made in contradiction of that crucial fact.) It's sadly typical for social issue advocates across the spectrum to cut off their nose to spite their face in this manner.
      - threatofrain 7y ago
        I mean you take the good with the bad, and it's on a chicken franchise to determine how interesting they think it is to have their progressive Sunday policy framed next to their stance that gay people shouldn't be able to marry.

dblohm7 7y ago

* Unless you’re a professional working at the pharmacy or hearing center. I’ve heard some pretty bad stories about those positions.

RSHEPP 7y ago
If you go on reddit pharmacy, you see people say Costco is by far the best retail pharmacy and almost impossible to get a full-time gig with.

exogeny 7y ago

This feels very similar yo Chick-Fil-A and In-N-Out and, well, the results are what they are.

EdwardWarren 7y ago
I heard from an In-N-Out employee that store managers make 6 figure salaries and there are two of them in each store. In-N-Out, Costco, and Chick-fil-a employees all seem to work really hard and are unfailingly good with customers. I had a problem in a Target once, talked to an employee about it and he went to 'check on it' and never came back. Just left me standing there.