The aesthetic layout of this store is atrocious. The mannequins are atrocious, I can tell you half the time customers made fun of the crap that was put on them. NOBODY would be caught dead in half the stuff that the visual team put on those mannequins. I mean they try to compare themselves to Nordstrom, which is an upscale/contemporary/modern department store. Von Maur is anything BUT that. I don't even know how they think they're going to survive at Perimeter and be directly next to a Nordstrom. They are in for one RUDE awakening!
The website looks like it was the first website to ever be created on the internet. I'm not really sure who your web designer is, but he/she needs to be fired. Or go back to web design school, it's horribly put together and the pictures of the clothing are ridiculous.
The time clock system(TESS) was ridiculous, being scheduled 9,10,11 days in a row should be illegal. Is that not some kind of slave labor? Yes I was signed on to be full time, but I certainly wasn't aware I'd be working that many days in a row..and it happened OFTEN! Also to work a 12-9pm shift and then to be scheduled for a 7am shift the next morning, what is that about? We were given a survey to fill out and list the biggest problems we had with TESS. Every single person I talked to wrote that down as their major concern. Do you think anything was done about? Nope! Whoever analyzed those surveys(which it was probably one of the upper managers) clearly didn't care and came back with some other bogus excuse.
I was also really sick and tired of going to cover in areas I was unfamiliar with, and other departments never seemed to have to cover anywhere. It was embarrassing for a customer to ask you a question on a product you had never seen before. Then they'd act like you were a total idiot for not obviously knowing the answer. I mean customers can be stupid too, and just think that since you work somewhere you obviously know EVERYTHING. However, it was ridiculous the amount of coverage slips we'd get on the cash bags each morning. Coverage in departments got to be extremely sparse and I understand every department needed a body for business needs. But to be so low on staff you can't even go to the BATHROOM? I mean really? I mean I just have no words, that's just beyond absurd. In my opinion upper management should have come and watched the department, but they were probably too busy online shopping in the HR office.
Oh also we couldn't have water on the floor we had to drink out of the water fountain that legit tasted like sewer water. I don't understand why we couldn't have water, at least to keep in the stock room. It's a CLEAR liquid, if it spills it's an easy clean up. Really don't understand that rule and why it was ever effective.
The truth of it is working in retail can be fun, when you work for a company who cares about you as an employee. Von Maur doesn't care about its employees, they only care about getting that $5 t-shirt sale from that customer. Any concern you voice will be "heard", but trust me nobody is really listening. It will go in one ear and straight out the other.
OH and really panty hose, skirt & a dress? I wasn't aware I was in 1955.
I left Von Maur on my own terms, so I'm not a "disgruntled employee" who was laid off or fired. I am just stating the facts and sharing my experience with this company.
