Want to loose your morale, come work for Michaels arts and crafts - Anonymous employee Michaels Employee Review

1.0
May 27, 2009
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

1. If you need a part time job this is the place to go. 2. They now have coupons comming out the a**. Seems like everyweek there is a 40% coupon and always a coupon through email also.

Cons

1. the pay is higher than most companines in this area but it later evens out because they cut your hours, pretty much you end up getting 4 hour shifts two to three days a week. You burn more gas getting to work than what you are going to make that day. 2. The training is poor. They put money towards the training videos but you won't know until you become hands on. So the communication from the one who physically trains you is very piss poor, especially in the framing department when you have to deal on an everyday basis with customer's priceless artwork. In framing you are trained (if the framing manager is not lazy) maybe two or three times (days) and then after a week you are thrown to the wolves to manage the department by yourself because in most stores no one else is trained in the framing department but the actual framers. I have worked there for going on 6 years and corporate still sees no need to cross train other workers for the framing department which in good economic times makes more money than the store itself. 3. If your a college student, don't expect to get promoted, you are a threat to most store managers. After a year of working there, I inquired about moving up the ladder and was told I had to drop out of college to do that. Disgusting!!! 4. Most times there is piss poor store management with bad ideas, bad attitudes, and poor communication. But they always manage to keep their jobs, as awful as they are, so instead of reprimanding the poor management for their poor decisions and poor behavior, they get moved to other stores and cause the same ruckus and have the same low standards for themselves. Corporate needs to spend money on re-training these individuals to be better managers. 5. Heaven forbid you get sick. You can't call out because of the new infractions in regards to the attendence policy, you loose points for calling out of work. Now people come to work sick and spreading their filth and germs to other employees. Just becuase management didn't want to punish the frequent offenders, those who actually come to work, on time, on a regular basis have to be punish. How fair is this. Ridiculous!!! Now that people are in desparate need you shoved out all of those SOPs and force us to sign due to your lack of sense to punish offenders. 6. One thing they need to realize, THE ECONOMY SUCKS NOW!!!!!!! How many people do you really think are going to come in and spend $150 -$300 on framing a custom piece now? I am aware that people priorities differ but I'm pretty sure that food and a roof comes before framing a picture. Framing sales are low because of this. Framers can't sell to an empty store nor can they sell framing standing on a street corner. Stop blaming and punishing the employees for things they don't have control over. 7. I find it ignorant how the customers get more of a discount than your employees. Employees only get 25% and yest customers can walk in with multiple coupons and receive 40% off.

Explore other reviews about Michaels

5.0
Feb 16, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Had a really lovely recruiter w/ clear email communication back and forth. Process was a phone screen followed by an interview.

Cons

Interviewers were slightly late to the interview. Lots of technical questions, no leetcode style ones though.

2.0
Jun 22, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Some great co-workers, employee discount, on site office benefits including a gym and cafe for breakfast/lunch, full suite of employee benefits at reasonable prices

Cons

Ridiculous amount of stress. Retail in general is often stressful but the amount of stress at Michaels is unnecessary and over the top. Constant last-minute changes by leadership to creative, promotions, products, and any other kind of changes. Things will be finalized and signed off on and delivered, and somebody will make a change at the last minute and things are constantly having to be redone. People are worn down and worn out. It’s the highest turnover rate of any place I’ve worked in retail at the corporate office. I’ve seen people take jobs and be gone within weeks. Leadership in some departments are extremely micromanaging and controlling even with employees that are tenured and have multiple years of experience. The stress level for both tenured and new employees is very high. Projects get discussed over and over and over again, decisions are made and then revisited again after decisions were made making delivery late and causing people to work unnecessarily in order to fix things that could’ve been done correctly the first time. The company tries really hard to make the workplace fun and offer activities, motivation, and incentives. Unfortunately they don’t offset what the environment is like working inside with some of the teams and expectations to actually deliver the work. Would not recommend.

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