Farm Boy Employee Reviews

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3.1Work-Life Balance

3.1Pay & Benefits

3.1Job Security & Advancement

2.8Management

3.1Culture

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3.0

the hours and work is ok but the management is a joke aswell as the training

Customer Service Representative (Former Employee) – Kingston, ON – 12 February 2019

workers are treated as disposable unless full time, too many mangers compared to regular employees. training is almost non existent until you are expected to complete a task and the health and safety is a joke

Pros

hours can be moved around due to employees needs

Cons

very little training

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1.0

worst place to possibly work at.

Customer Service Representative (Former Employee) – Kingston, ON – 17 January 2019

everyone was nice and sweet at first, and thats how they got you. I started and I loved it. then.. it all went down hill from there. I started, went to all my shifts, even the shifts I wasn't allowed ro work, and the ones they couldn't get covered. I was always there. then all the sudden, I wasn't suitable to work and wasn't "for-filling there standers". then completely out of the blue, fired me. I was crushed. but no word on why, which is wrong. I called hr, texted both managers in my department, and still no word from anyone. they barley gave any breaks during long shifts and the managers made you do the work they're assigned to do, but just dont want too. would 10/10 recommend not working here.

Pros

nothing.

Cons

everything.

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2.0

Not my favorite position

Assistant Department Manager (Current Employee) – GTA, ON – 8 February 2019

It's retail which can be hard and stressful. The expectation of working close shifts followed by open shifts for management is undesirable, the wage is not really competitive. Work-life balance is completely disregarded once you are in management positions, you will be working a minimum of 50 hours a week and will only be paid you 44-hour salary. The culture and environment are unpleasant. If you are willing to put up with the really painful standard of work vs. the wage then this job is okay I suppose. There is better work out there, but this isn't a bad place to get your feet wet in retail.

Cons

hours and expectations

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3.0

Made Friends but the Job Could've Been A Lot Better

Cashier in the Service Department (Former Employee) – Kitchener, ON – 28 November 2018

I worked here for two years and it was my first job. Management changed a lot and they never were that great at their job. I made friends and we all bonded over what we had to complain about the job, but it had its great moments and bad.

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4.0

Great workplace for advancement

Chef Supervisor (Former Employee) – Kingston, ON – 12 February 2019

Great opportunity for career growth. Wonderful compensation to responsibility ratio. Understanding and very considerate management. Great place for students to work, and also a great place for career growth.

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1.0

Slavery/Abuse: The Job

Grocery Manager (Former Employee) – Ottawa, ON – 14 January 2019

My experience at Farm Boy started out great-
Until they didn't train me for the job I was doing, (which was running a department,) Refused to pay me for all my hours worked (Over 100 unpaid hours), called me in on my days off for unpaid shifts, called me in on my vacation.. etc.

I wanted to step down, so I told them I could keep managing for 2 weeks, until they got a replacement.
The told me I needed to do 3 weeks, I agreed for the sake of getting my position.
After not getting my paperwork for my new supervisor position I was stepping down to, I became frustrated to find that they were just planning on letting me go at the end of my extended 3 weeks they begged me to work.

After some MORE negotiation, I managed to get a position in another store, only to find out they were paying me minimum wage to do a Managers job.
Needless to say, I walked out that day.

This company treats their staff so expendable and so terribly it blows my mind.
Do yourself a favor if they offer you management, and turn it down. They will work you until you cannot work anymore.
I haven't seen my family in over a year because of the rubbish this company subjected me to.

Managers walk out all the time in this company. There's no stability, and it's crumbling at the base - The people working in the retail locations.

Pros

OK Salary

Cons

Unpaid hours, unrealistic expectation, crooked/abusive upper management

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5.0

Great Workplace with friendly people

Supervisor (Current Employee) – Ottawa, ON – 19 January 2019

Great Workplace with friendly people who have a passion for food. The most enjoyable part of the job is being able to build relationships with customers.

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1.0

Read this review and make your own Choice

Chef Manager (Current Employee) – Ontario – 22 December 2018

So you have an interview at farm boy. You have read the reviews. And you have thought no that can’t be right. These former employees are just bitter or disgruntled. Well trust me these reviews are accurate. As a department manager or assistant manager or supervisor. You are expected to work 10 to 14 hour days every shift. If your not willing to do things “the farm boy way “ your looked down upon. Read your contract if it says up to 58hours a week you will be working 58 hours a week. And you will not be compensated for it. Not only do you have your store manager and assistant manager. You will have “specialists “ to deal with and not just your department “specialist “ but all of them. Yes they are voted best in customer service but that is because they want you to sacrifice your life for the customer. There is no work life balance. I was expected to mid my sons 1st. Birthday for work. Yep expected

Now yeah I am upset with this company as I was told many things during the month long hiring process. All of them turned out to be false.

Pros

Free coffe every shift (after 3 months)

Cons

Upper management, discount, pay

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3.0

not really enjoyable

Chef and Customer Support Assistant (Former Employee) – Ottawa South, ON – 30 October 2018

the culture in the store isn't really that bad. the employee's are quite respectful to the customers and are always helpful, but in my case i had problems with some of the people who worked there longer than i have. i was asked to relieve my position, for reason not denounced to me, and was actually quite glad i left when i could.

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4.0

Good job for student

Cashier (Former Employee) – Kanata, ON – 18 January 2019

accommodated student life-style
Friendly staff
My store location could have included more diversity in its staff
I enjoyed improving within my role
Dynamic environment

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1.0

Not a very nice place to work.

Cashier (Former Employee) – Merivale, ON – 7 February 2019

I wish I had known about leaving a review sooner because I would have. I only worked there for 6 months but in that time I was constantly looked down upon, I never got cash shifts because I would take too long to coubt my till at the end of my shift. I know this because they would punish me by putting me on kart duty shifts and I would ALWAYS have to work the mascot shift. The day I put in my 2 weeks was probably the best day of my life. Also the people I worked with weren't friendly at all, I had no friends working there.

Pros

None

Cons

None

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5.0

Fun environment

Baker (Former Employee) – Ottawa, ON – 18 January 2019

People are friendly. After a certain point job becomes repetitive but easier. Good job for teenagers, people looking for short term work. Wouldnt make it a career.

Pros

Low Stress

Cons

pay

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1.0

Most stressful company I have ever worked for

Cashier (Former Employee) – Pickering, ON – 3 December 2018

This company never learns from they’re mistakes that they constantly make for example

they’ll have a whole bunch of people starting from grand opening and then they will start to cut down on staff until a point when we can’t get any lower than we can as low as we can of the amount of workers we have and then everybody quits and then they go and have a job fair (for a store that’s not new but everybody is) they like to rapidly increase your duties but not your pay and then they’ll do the same thing chew, swallow, repeat! And they will make you come in if you call in sick (illegal!)

They have all these specialists that are a complete waste of space all they do is hassle you and everybody else and are henchmen for the district managers and get this they have way too many of you ask me, they will have a meat specialist and a seafood specialist, and a cheese specialist and a deli specialist (they’re both the same thing) and they will call you and will force you to come in or come into another store on your day off! And everyone like department managers and store managers can figure things out without them!

Whenever there’s a new employee they have to train the company doesn’t give us any training hours and expect us to have this new employee do amazing when yet we have to do our own duties like inventory counts and everything else and they will make the place so badly over staffed at first and then so badly understaffed and the department with the highest turnover rate is chef cause they’re always having new people everyday it feels like caus they’re not able to train people more... properly and they only want you focusing on the few things that they’re trained with and nothing else and then when the time come for them to learn something else they’re complaining to you like why don’t they know it and that’s because they never wanted them trained for it

Managers are on salary and they will not get any kind of compensation for all the amount of time they have worked and that’s more then 60 hours a week and there’s also a very high turnover rate for managers and we all feel bad for them cause they’re working very hard for us and the managers get treated so badly by upper management.
Company policy is managers are not suppose to socialize with employees or even have them on Facebook which is absolutely ridiculous.

And they’re always cutting hours down whenever people want/need hours and then they try and give us hours whenever we don’t need them and they’ll say if you want more hours you’ll have to be transferred to another store that does double the business (for example Whitby or Etobicoke) but yet they lie to you cause they will still give you the same amount of hours for a store that does more business or less than another

But the good part about farm boy is they hire good and friendly people that you will get along with, and you get a 10% discount off of everything (except alcoholics)
Hopefully with empire company (sobeys) buying over farm boy, things will run better and clean things up less

Pros

Employee discount, employees

Cons

Phoney company, specialist/upper management, underpaid, very stressful, no overtime pay

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2.0

You'll have some fun coworkers, but overall, it's a bit of a miserable place to work

Customer Service Representative (Former Employee) – Ottawa, ON – 19 October 2018

Serving and assisting customer's needs, cleaning frequently after whatever work you've done, closing/opening a department, perhaps helping out in other departments if they're short staffed.

Cons

Very poor management who aren't always professional and will pick favorites

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1.0

Need to hire better Store Managers and Upper Management

N/A (Former Employee) – Cambridge, ON – 9 December 2018

Store Managers basically just sit upstairs in their office all day while all the hard working, underpaid managers run the show downstairs. They yell at all their managers when they are "doing poor work" and not living up to the "Farm Boy Way". The company needs to be hiring more compassionate people to lead their management teams. They seem to forgot if they don't have managers running each department, it would be utter chaos on the sales floor. Department Managers are treated like dirt and expected to kill themselves for nothing. Overworked and underpaid. Specialists are a complete waste of money and don't support their teams at all. When a department needs help, no one is there to help other than other managers. The Department Managers cannot go to their Store Managers for help, instead have to whisper in the back of the store about how much they hate their jobs. I have overheard many conversations in the back of my store from managers talking about management. HIRE BETTER STORE MANAGERS AND TREAT YOUR EXISTING MANAGERS BETTER!!! THEY ARE THE ONES MAKING MONEY FOR YOUR COMPANY. I highly doubt anyone is going to even read this review, and even if they do, will they care? Will they ever care about how poorly their management staff is treated and how they are destroying people's home life and mental health? NO. They only care about making money.
THE ONLY ENJOYABLE THING ABOUT FARM BOY is the compassionate department managers. They will do what they can for their staff, to hide the fact that upper management is terrible. Seriously Farm Boy, you need to make some changes or your more... bad reputation will keep growing and screw you in the end. Like I said, no one will read this from Farm Boy. They don't care what their slaves have to say or think about them. less

Pros

None.

Cons

Everything listed.

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3.0

High pace, stressful work environment

Customer Service Representative (Former Employee) – Ottawa, ON – 2 October 2018

A typical day at work does not exist seeing as everyday could be different
I learned how to effectively manage a high stress situation
The management was helpful to the best of their ability
The wprkplace culture was poor seeing as the staff was constantly under high stress

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2.0

Please read;

Manager (Former Employee) – Greater Toronto Area, ON – 1 November 2018

So many people take the time to review a company before applying to work for it. Good on you, it's the smart thing to do. But, you're probably also thinking your experience will be different from the ones reflected in the reviews.. Don't make the same mistake I did. Here are some things you should know first:

•You are not payed for overtime, nor do you recieve any time owed for hours worked after 44hrs. Yes! You're working for free (managers)
•Dept managers regularly work overtime, some working up to 14 hrs a day, 5-6 days a week
•Wanna know why managers work so much overtime? Because there is a policy within Farmboy that requires a Store Manager to sign off on your department before you go home. So if your department isn't pristine, you're not going anywhere
•Which brings me to next point, the work to life balance is poor because of rules like this, and if you don't present as someone who isn't willing to throw your life away for your department, you're viewed in a poor light and seen as "not dedicated"
•The turnover rate is HIGH. Good luck finding staff to stay with you consistently. And because its high, a lot of your departments burden falls on you due to never having any experienced staff. High ups don't care, and only wish to see results. Doesn't matter how those results come about
•Farmboy doesn't give you an extra day off during the week for statutory holidays like companies are required to do. Instead you work a regular 44hr, or probably 70hr work week, and they try to compensate you with "time owed" but good luck actually trying to use that time owed to take more... a day off
•The starting salary is decent until you factor in the amount of overtime you're expected to do. At that point the salary is just insulting

Having said all this.. Think carefully about the decision to join this company, and I wouldn't take the reveiws with a grain of salt. My advice? Believe what they're telling you and save yourself the disappointment. less

Pros

In store products can be really good, friendly staff, some benefits

Cons

Everything else

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1.0

I recommend this place as a joke

Chef Customer Service Rep (Former Employee) – Whitby, ON – 2 October 2018

Terrible management. As someone who has worked in a few grocery store retail environments, this takes the cake. Was called useless by my manager because I was a college student and had limited availability. At night when you are trying to close and just go home, the store manager would walk up to you and ask you to do a random task 10 minutes before you are done that should be done by a professional cleaning company. One time I had injured myself and when I came back and told that my doctor requested that I do not work for a couple of days I was told by the "lovely" HR lady that the company would not provide me any support, even though the injury was their own fault because they would leave boxes of packaging on the floor in tight areas and did not care enough to have somebody clean it up. The old store manager took the side of the managers no matter what and with joy would yell at you in front of customers and would commonly walk by employees without greeting them. I mean if you hate yourself you might as well work here. Also, good luck ever getting a promotion as they heavily play favourites and it has nothing to do with the quality of worker you are. It seems to be so bad now that they have to post a help wanted sign at the department because the turn over is so high because of their unrealistic working expectations and lack of training.

Pros

None

Cons

Long Hours, Verbal Abusive, Favoritism, Unrealistic Expectations

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4.0

Excellent employer, fast-paced and challenging environment

SERVICE MANAGER (Former Employee) – London – 12 October 2018

This is a fantastic company to work for, growing quickly in the province, and a challenging work environment. Company strives to treat others the way they want to be treated.

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2.0

Long hours

Deli Clerk (Former Employee) – Ottawa, ON – 6 October 2018

Typical day at work : starts 1pm and is given a list of tasks that need to be done by the end of the day.
What I have learned : Being comfortable in your workplace is very important.
Management : Some really have their favourrites but some are fai.r
Workplace culture : Different feel , learn a lot of healthy food options.
Hardest part of the job : Very demanding on your time.
Enjoyable part : My co-workers

Pros

Learn about organic foods

Cons

Very demanding of your time

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1.0

Looks great..until you're hired.

Service Supervisor (Former Employee) – Whitby, ON – 7 September 2018

From the outside world farmboy looks like a great company.. its canadian, it promotes local foods, and claims to have the freshest products. HOWEVER, once you are a part of the team they schedule you for 10 hours shifts, which would be fine, except they have you work until closing ( sometimes that means 11pm finish times) and then have you scheduled for 8am the next day. I called those shifts clopens. They said there is room for advancement but I tried for a promotions for 3 years before they gave me one. They offer some health benefits but they treat employees like cattle. if you don't put 150% effort into what you do you are replaced. while working as a cashier I managed to stay employed for 3 years and saw hundreds of employees circulate. if you cant handle the heat, stay outta the kitchen!!

Pros

yearly raises.

Cons

long hours and difficult emplployees

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