Complaint Review:
Olan Mills Anderson SC
Olan Mills, Anderson SC The District is HORRIBLY unorganized, and they LIE Anderson, South Carolina
I worked for the store back in 2010. When I was hired, I was told that I would be on the fast track to a Lead Sales position. I was very excited about this I mean, I was getting hired by Olan Mills, a nationally recognized company that has taken many of the family portraits that hang on my wall. I was pretty much sold to the job when the manager said something about $8/hr base pay. I knew about anything after that was commissioned and that there were sales goals, I mean after all this was a sales position. Later that night after I was hired, I received a phone call saying that I would be training at a store that was almost an hour away.
I did this because I really needed a job. During my training I was excelling through my goals like crazy, the District Manager was praising me, my trainer was praising me, the girl that actually worked in that store was loving me because while training, you don't get to keep the commission from the sales you make, it goes to whoever is working at that store. (keep that little tidbit of info because it will be handy later on) After three days of training, and the constant drilling that I would be turning the Anderson SC location around with how well I make sales, I was ECSTATIC to be out on my own.
My first week I exceeded my sales quota, I was like a kid in a candy store selling left and right. But after that first week, I realized I was seeing the same customers coming in and out of the store, if even any customers came in the store at all. But I still managed to stay over my quota for the week. My photographers were ALWAYS booked up. I felt horrible telling people that they would only have to put 12 dollars down for this AMAZING package, just so I could keep my job, but its what I had to do. I knew that it would end up being more than 12 because the photographers also have a quota and that had to sell things too or else they lost their job.
After my first week, suddenly my DM and RM were let go. They both worked there for several years, and this really scared me, and I had every right to be scared. Things started changing FAST a manager from a different district came in and was finishing training, she fired the other CSM and hired in a guy that she thought was promising. HE DIDN'T EVEN HAVE TO GO THROUGH TRAINING. I had several sales positions before working at Olan Mills and I had to go through training, but someone with NO sales experience got to start the next day. So I said something to the manager, and she said, you will be getting his sales, so being the nice person I was, I helped him learn the ropes and make sales. That day I thought I was going home knowing that I made 14 sales in one 6 hour period.
The next day I was really REALLY sick, and I got a phone call from the new RM saying that I was being let go due to performance. I was like, SERIOUSLY? You do know I made 14 sales yesterday right? The RM said that the temp manager only put me in the system for 5 and that the new employee had the rest of the sales. I told her what was said about the new employee and she told me to come in the next day DURING CHURCH HOURS in South Carolina.. NO ONE IS OUT SHOPPING AT THOSE TIMES, THEY ARE ALL AT CHURCH, but I was still going to go in. Sadly (or not who knows) I woke up that morning, still sicker than a dog, I couldn't even talk, which was VERY important for the sales job. When I called my RM she told me that she was just going to let me go. (they were probably going to do that after that day anyways).
Yes the sales were not as great at the Anderson K-mart as at the rest of the stores, but Why would you want to have your studios in a store that NO ONE shops at anymore? I mean I went to my manager with SOO many suggestions, I offered to go to the Jockey Lot (flea market) and advertise and sell coupons, I said we should make signs and put them on the side of the road so that people can see the Olan Mills name and be tempted to check us out. I had so many ideas to spread the word about Olan Mills, and I was shot down with every single one of them. They never even gave me a chance, and this was coming from a company that I used to think so highly of.
1 Updates & Rebuttals
tiger1968
United States of AmericaOlan Mills Employment Practices
#2UPDATE EX-employee responds
Sun, June 10, 2012
I first went to work at Olan Mills back in 1992 when they still actually had studios. Back then, the portrait sittings were sold by part-time telemarketers rather than Kmart-based carnival barkers. We telemarketers worked out of a very small "office" in the back of the studio and were not allowed to even think about speaking to any of the studio employees or the customers (that we got to come into the studio for sittings in the first place). Then, after several weeks of working as a part-time telemarketer, because I did so well, I was promoted to the studio employee position of receptionist and also began to train to be a photographer and proof consultant.
At that time, other than having to come into work during The Storm of the Century (1993 in Florida), I had no problems with my job, and was looking forward to spending many years with the company - that is, until the one time that I needed to take an actually work day off. Although I had given the District Manager several day's notice that I would have to take that day off, she wouldn't hear of it and told me that if I didn't show up, I'd be fired. So, I kept that very important doctors appointment and as per her threat, lost my job.
I went back to work in the phone room a few year later and can't remember how that stint ended, but...
So, in March 2010 (now living in North Carolina), I went to work for Olan Mills once again. This time, I was hired as an ASR in a Kmart that was full of regular repeat customers - most of whom didn't even speak English. This was just under a month before Easter, so sales were easy to get at first, but as the holiday got closer and closer, sales dwindled - so much so that I stopped just standing up front and started walking around the store soliciting customers as they shopped. Since most of the shoppers where repeat customers, walking the store didn't help much either.
So, on the day before Easter, the studio manager decided that I might do better outside. This was a very windy day in April, my allergies were in full swing, and with all of the barking I'd done on top of that, laryngitis had set in too. No one heading into the front door was interested in buying, so I called the District Manager and asked if I could walk the store instead since most customers came in through the lawn and garden area anyway, and she had no problem with that.
So, I put the table away, grabbed a cart, and set out to make more than just the one sale that I managed to get earlier in the day. But, before too long, the studio manager (who had been out to lunch) paged me to the studio and went off on me - telling me that from that day forward, rain or shine, I was to work outside. Since it was the day before Easter, I had a few hours left in my shift, and had only made one sale all day, I asked to go home to save my spiff stats. The manager was okay with that, but said that I would need to call the District Manager.
So, I did that, and continued to call her throughout the weekend and into Easter Monday because I only ever got her voicemail and had left a message telling her why I left early and that I needed to talk to her before I came back in. I had not quit my job, but when the District Manager finally did return my call, she said that they assumed that I had quit and gave my job to someone else, but I was more than welcome to reapply. I did reapply - more than once, and at several different locations, but was only ever given the runaround.
Then, last Friday (now in Georgia), Olan Mills suddenly appeared in the Kmart down the street, and when my mother told the guy about me and my previous Olan Mills employment, he excitedly handed her an application and practically begged her to get me to come in, so I hightailed it up there, talked to him for a few minutes, came back in the next day for an interview that seemed to go better than any I've had recently. He said that he was very impressed and wanted to start me right away, but would need to contact Human Resources first.
Since they would be closed until Monday (6/4/12), he'd call them and then me then, but he never called me. So, I went back up to the store on Tuesday and again on Wednesday. He was not there either day, so I pulled his number up on my Caller ID and sent him a text. He did respond back that Tuesday and Wednesday were his days off and that he would call me on Thursday. When he hadn't called by that afternoon, I left him a voicemail. He did return that call a few hours later, but only to tell me that he had received a voicemail from Human Resources, but hadn't spoken to them yet.
So, on Friday, I sent him another text. He said he hadn't called Human Resources until Wednesday and that there were other candidates in the running, but as soon as he heard anything, he'd call me. It is now Saturday (a full week since this charade began). I got a call from the District Manager this morning. She said she was calling to let applicants know that the position was filled. When I asked if I was labelled as a non-re-hire, she said, "No. We just decided to go with another method." So, I asked, "Another method?! What is "another method," and she couldn't answer me. But, I think I figured it out.
I bet you any amount of money that now that Lifetouch has bought Olan Mills and is already set to close their Chattanooga facilities, they are also getting set to reopen the Olan Mills Portrait Studios as Photo booths that will be located at the fronts of stores with the vending machines and video games. That's the only other method I can think of anyway - that is, unless they plan to bring back the phone room, but I digress...
Historically, the Olan Mills photographers have produced some very profession portraits, but the customer service that they provide to both inside (coworkers) and outside (general public) customers absolutely sucks. Thank God a couple of my childhood friends own their own portrait studios.