The Siren's Eye

I have three shifts left behind the bar at store 6638. Since I was hired at the Hover store, three more stores have opened in Longmont. The company has hired over 67,000 people since I started work on September 12th. I work for a giant, green beast that is devouring street corners and strip malls in the night. You’ll go to bed one night and wake up with a green, Bucks’ awning across the street. The Siren (an ancient, female sea deity) will be staring out from behind the window with a smirk on her face and her long flowing black and white locks will be covering her naked breasts that, by the way, aren’t covered in the original logo. Just visit the first store. You’ll see.

This company gets a lot of press about being such a great one to work for. If you average more than 20 hours a week you get benefits. What are the benefits? You can enroll in an amazing health coverage program that will run you $33 a paycheck. You can also start a 401K. You are offered a stock plan. In this plan you determine what percent of your paycheck you want to devote to purchasing stock at a 15% discount. The Bucks’ stock isn’t falling, so you pretty much have an instant 15% growth on your investment. However, I don’t see the companies stock climbing that much over a short time unless their music label takes off, and by the sound of Paul McCartney's latest album, that won't be happening.

All the benefits are nice, aren't they? There are some holes though. In order to get a guaranteed 40 hour work week an employee needs to be an assistant store manager or a store manager. Having expressed a desire for as many hours as possible and open availability, I have hovered between 20 and 35 hours a week for 99% of my time there. This wouldn’t be that bad if the Bucks paid employees the way they could. I am talking at least a double digit money amount an hour. They don’t pay that though. They lose a lot of ground on the good employer ladder when it comes to base pay. And that is what really counts for me. I don’t feel like a valued employee there. The company can underestimate my importance to their local and regional success. That is the nature of the beast. Paying such detail to the part is unacceptable when it can be replaced with a brand new part for less.

A company’s treatment of their employees needs to come full circle. Good benefits, a full work week (if desired), loyalty to the employee, and good pay are major qualities of a good employer. The Bucks does a good job on one of these. That’s a 25%. Sorry, there’s no curve.