Pros
THERE WILL ALWAYS BE WORK. Strong Company! You learn how to communicate with customers, work in a hectic environment, and how to deal with tough situations. Christmas and summer bonuses are nice (couple hundred dollars for part time and about a thousand and up for fulltime/mgmt). Also there are some good mentors to learn from. Most Store Managers and AVP/VPs are actual cool professional people.
Cons
Where do I start. Their culture is failing, in the years I worked there I saw so many people just leave including A LOT OF YOUNG management. This is always a bad sign. Why are your future leaders leaving so often...? P.S. I was there for years and got to App Tech the step right before Assistant manager because I refused to accept the full time promotion offer (which was flattering). Lets go over some of the problems, They WILL try to change your schedule, even if you tell them your availability. They ALL HATE what they do, I worked with and I stay in contact with MANY current and ex employees, they all hate it. Because misery loves company and they see 20 cars on the list, it doesn't matter if it is your day off, or if your schedule says you leave at a certain time, THEY WILL ALWAYS WANT YOU TO STAY. Classic lines from Discount Tire Mgmt "Can you do one more car" "Let me see your college schedule" (as if that matters if you want to work part time?) "Hey your really ******* us if you leave right now". The management is usually only a high school graduates and when they have worked 5-10-15-20 years for discount tire, they cant fathom that maybe some of their employees do not want to work as tire guys their entire life. THE WORK IS RIDICULOUS, I like most employees started as a tire tech and through the years I worked up to sales/and being a service Coordinator. No matter what you are never fast enough, I found myself yelling at my techs because of the pressure, I turned into the thing I use to despise at one point. It is so busy that they typically do not allow you to take lunches on Friday or Saturday and give you 5 minutes.... let me repeat that 5 minutes to eat. Think of this, literal 9-12 hour days with no lunches, even though this is very illegal. People are in bad moods all the time, always argue, gossip, and the quality of people you work with at Discount tire rarely have the same integrity as more white collar companies. THERE IS NO, NO NO NO NO NOOOOO Work life balance, you will hate your life, all you get is Sundays for body, mind and soul recovery. The pay for the first level of full time is maybe 36-38k a year.... btw you will be working 50-60 HARD hours for that salary, I left discount and immediately used my degree to work 40 hours a week for 42k a year, and guess what I leave right at 8 hours, I dont get dirty, and I have my weekends free. This is not a good place to work, and the only thing worth staying for is the store manager position which takes at least 8-15 years to get (MAYBE) if you are the right guy for the job, or you could get a bachelors degree, apply your brain and make more without worry in a quarter of the time. This is a good right out of High School job for like a year or two, but dont let them talk you into moving on with the company if you are truly not passionate about it, I saw them sell the "Dream" to every single person who could at least count to 3. If you value work life balance, college, and quick high paying growth, do not make this a career.
