Pros
Decent pay. Free meal before or after your shift. Overnight crew could play music while we worked.
Cons
Management was very demanding, and did not always take proof times or bake size into account when deciding how long your shift should be, if a bake was $200 smaller because you had fewer muffins and cookies, they wanted you to be able to leave 2 hours earlier, even though you still had to proof and bake all the bagels and breads for the same length of time. If you were on your own for the night, you were supposed to be able to do the work of 2 people with only 1-2 extra hours in your shift. Management would also blame you for breads and bagels not rising properly, even though all of the yeast products were made in a central location and shipped to the store, so you had little to no control over how things were produced there. (We had flat Whole Grain Miche for a few months, every store in my are had a problem, and asked our Market Manager to work with the central location, nut we all still got blamed every single day that it was flat.) Management also switched a day baker to overnight, but only gave her five days notice that they were doing so. Three other bakers at my location quit within 9 months time while I was still employed at Panera. Management was also not always understanding about personal health issues, I was ill and requested that I be given some time off to heal, and was basically told that if I took a 1-2 weeks for myself, that there would most likely not be a job for me when I came back. I quit shortly after.