Guitar Center reviews

- New CEO has gutted much of what made company worth sticking around at. Laid off or fired many people to save money - New CEO has ruined employee purchase and financing programs which is what kept a lot of part time staff on board - New uniform programs go against the "Be yourself" ethos company was founded on - Corporate management can be both overly micro managing and inept at realizing what's going on in stores ate the same time - Many "In the field" jobs that people aspired to have and were vital to proper training and morale have been eliminated

Guitar Center is a Company that completely lost its culture and simply no longer cares about its employees. I worked at Guitar Center for 15 years and it really was a great company for the first 6-8 years I was there. From 2010 - present, most of the things you have read about this company are absolutely true. I held a corporate-level position for the last few years of my sentence and it was very intriguing to get an inside glimpse of the tomfoolery that takes place there. The Top 4 Executives of the Company are from Target, Lowe's, Best Buy and a small Grocery Store chain. You can imagine how "music-oriented" the business plan is. It's a retailer, that's it. And, it's a very low-paying retailer at that. Stores are Unionizing, labor is consistently being cut (because, it's their largest "controllable" expense), the manager's bonus program is made more and more difficult to achieve, top line sales are WAY OFF, a series of layoffs happen annually (including 2 different waves in 2015 which included many of the founders of the company and some of my closest friends), and it's completely lost its way. Store Managers start off making $37k a year, which is 1995 money, Operations managers are lucky to make $30k a year, and you can anticipate $9/hour for a while if you are looking to join the team. The mantra of the company should be, "Either you, or your replacement, will get us what we're looking for." It's command and control. They want people who will shut up, keep their head down and "run the play". Miserable work environment, which is why I left on my own terms.