Comment by irateswami | Hacker News Reader

Comment by irateswami | Hacker News Reader

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Whew boy do I have some stories that might shatter your view of trader joe's being a good company.

Prime example: my store captain, Jeff, got busted having an affair with a crew member that he was a direct supervisor of. Granted, Jeff was an asshole from the day I met him, he did everything he could to hold up my (and many others) promotions and pay raises just because he could, but the thing that got him finally fired was dipping his pen in the company ink.

I was personally denied safety equipment multiple times, like lift belts and new blades for my box cutter.

I know of a another store Captain that got fired for kicking out customers that weren't wearing masks when they tried to come in.

TJ's is extremely anti-union and anti-union propaganda is posted all over the employee areas and handbook.

Trader Joe's corporate will turn a blind eye to ANYTHING, as long as a customer doesn't complain or it doesn't open up the company to some kind of liability. It was a super cool company up until about 20 years ago when Bane took over as CEO. Since then it has been a cavalcade of hiring shitty management and unsustainable growth. TJ's has lost it's original weltanschauung and Joe Coloumbe would be horrified to see how the company is run now.

I don't understand the first item, it seems unlike the others.

As I understand it, the reason you're not supposed to do what Jeff did, is because of exactly what you say in the next sentence - favoritism and bias, that undermines morale and leads to a dysfunctional team and good people leaving.

That first paragraph sounds to me like you are not connecting the affair with the "assholeness" and you think it's bad he got fired. Which doesn't go with everything else you write.

If your point is that they waited too long to do the right thing, well, that doesn't seem like systemic evil to me, even if there is other proof they aren't a "good company". I wouldn't put it in the same category of all the rest of the stuff you describe.

Everybody knows about the allegation that TJs wouldn't let people wear BLM apparel, right?

>As I understand it, the reason you're not supposed to do what Jeff did, is because of exactly what you say in the next sentence - favoritism and bias, that undermines morale and leads to a dysfunctional team and good people leaving.

My reading was that the poster was indignant that it took the actual outing of the affair to bring about change, when the actual workplace problems caused by them were evident beforehand.

Sure, I'm kind of saying that if they were slow to take action, but nonetheless did, then that is consistent with an ordinary mediocre corporation run by human beings, in my mind, and not evidence of being distinctly evil. In point of fact, I know stuff like that goes on elsewhere.

So putting it first was unclear to me in its implication.

> It was a super cool company up until about 20 years ago when Bane took over as CEO.

Your experience is the opposite of mine working for the company. Many of the most kind and competent managers I've had were from there.

But... I left the company 15+ years ago so things might have changed a lot since then. I will say that the stores were run pretty independantly back then so I wouldn't be surprised if experiences varied quite a bit.

It's certainly a well-worn path from "founder builds great company" to "founder sells out" to "new management are assholes" to "company goes down the tubes."

What's worse, it's not always apparent from the outside. But I don't really know if TJ is going down that path, and you haven't presented clear evidence that it is.

You had me up until "TJ's is extremely anti-union."

Is it not? Or do you just not feel that's a negative?

I wonder if that's a regional problem. Here (Michigan), TJ's employees seem happy, and appear to be very well treated.

As opposed to employees at Kroger - which is unionized (UCFW). But workers there appear darn scarce, often unhappy, and sometimes volunteer tidbits on just how horrible management is. And it felt weird just how much "help wanted" signage Kroger had, even pre-pandemic.

I feel union and non-union shops almost “need each other” to keep them both honest.

Kroger and Kroger owned stores turn over employees like crazy - I have several friends who’ve described really horrendous conditions. I don’t think there’s a lot of benefit in their union, that or it was so awful before that even bad conditions were better. Grocery store revenue increased greatly during the pandemic but workers still had to fight tooth and nail for PPE, and never got any amount of hazard pay. Ask anyone who is/was considered an “essential worker” what that actually meant sometime. The answer: less than nothing.

That cashiers still have to stand up has always been the bellweather to me about whether a grocery store takes any care of their employees.

I’m sorry you had a bad experience! For me, TJs was by far the best place to shop during the pandemic.

Strict capacity limits, a clearly marked, spaced queue outside the store, and they’d wipe down the carts right in front of you so you knew it was clean. Masks were ubiquitous on customers and employees. It was relief to shop there compared to other stores.

"Had a bad experience" ...?

The comment you're replying to was an employee, not a customer! It sounds like the main point is that TJ exploits its employees and is willing to turn a blind eye to their wellbeing in order to make a good experience for customers, which isn't a healthy strategy.

Employee have experiences too? For the most part, if you are making the space safe for customers, you are making it safe for employees. Their specific complaint was a situation that was safe for neither, and doesn't align with what I saw when I shopped there.

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