Complaint Review: Martin Lawrence Galleries San Francisco - Nationwide

  I was hired as a Sales Associate June 1st 2017. The Gallery was beautiful and I respected and believed in the Art Gallery and a Majority of what they sold. During my 3 week training I worked 8 hours a day and had three to five hours of homework a night to learn about all the Artist we represent and books on types of prints, etchings aquatints and litho and seriougraphs. The first three weeks I was given nothing but a hard time. Being yelled at for placing a cup of tea on a coworkers desk to being yelled at By the Managers Wife for drinking the bottled water in the refrigerator and was told it was for customers only. The Manager failed to tell me that his wife was the Director of Sales which legally is a huge conflict for nepotism is illegal in a private held company. It gives the employees upstairs a unfair advantage that's why there joined income is 15% of the overall sales of the Gallery and Alina the bosses wife makes 85% of the yearly sales yet is only on the sales floor 10% of the time. She receives her clients from the general website inquiries directly from her husband and writes down the information email and what Artwork they want to buy and in less than an hour the deal generally is closed and she makes 3-5 months salary of the average employee. Many class action lawsuits have occurred from nepotism due to the non use of governing dynamics. The referrals and inquiries from the General email are cherry picked by the bosses wife and very few leads are given in equal distribution to the employees on the sales floor.

Illegal Art Fraud is committed on a daily basis. My boss Chadwick Johnson told me in his office boasting that are job is to steal art. We are offered Art for sale on a daily basis most of the time from former clients that purchased art from us within the past 20 years. He told me never to quote them a fair market price and to be firm and ask the seller to come up with an asking price if their is a work we are interested in. In this business practice we can some times buy art for a small percentage of what the retail value is worth. During my training which I was told by the company was a paid training period my boss Chadwick Johnson showed me the shipping room and made a statement that sometimes they ship books for A list repeat clients to help them with V.A.T. Tax on larger purchases. I was accused one time of trying to poach a client of Alina's while I was upstairs with another client. I was sitting on the couch and a client walked away from Alina and started asking me questions about the Art in the gallery. I politely answered their questions and even said: make sure you grab Alina's card for you are her client. Later that day I was yelled at and humiliated in front of my coworkers and was verbally threatened by her. She also made a statement in front of the assistant "Dasha" that I should go work at a restaurant as a waiter. She immediately went down stairs and reported this to my boss. I told him to check the camera's and found out they were all disconnected. Likely for the reason A list clients Buy Artwork in the 6 and 7 figures and walk out the front door with it and avoid paying sales and V.A.T. Taxes. Many times this has happened and clients have walked out the door with priceless work's of Art. Money laundering has also occurred their a former employee was telling me of a sale before she retired which was all cash and over 400k. The Gallery doors had to be locked that day due to this situation and I wonder how much of that money made it to the owner's in New York City. Personally I decided to resign as of Friday the morning of the 14 of July. The previous day Was Very long for my boss wasn't there and I ran the Gallery with Integrity and Honor. I was asked to take care of two senior employees Barry and Frank and I gave them preferred treatment when it came . I was not allowed to take a lunch break and was scolded for it by my boss Chadwick Johnson.!!I swear that this statement is true and I am willing to take a polygraph test to this statement This is where I sign off. Don't work For the Gallery Martin Lawrence they will try and make a slave out of you steal commissions and pay you less than minimum wage.