Card Factory Reviews

Where do I begin - I contemplated writing this review for a number of weeks and at first I decided that I wouldn't however after weeks of thinking, I decided I have nothing to lose and wanted people to know what it really is like to work for this company. - As a Store Manager, I had a Line Manager (Regional Manager) who I quite honestly believe is not capable of doing his job. The first problem with him is that he has picked his favourites across the region and if you are not one of those favourites then you do not stand any chance of receiving any help or support. I ran quite a high turnover store and in my last few months at the company, he probably spent about fifteen minutes with me in store talking about my store - by the way, not talking about it constructively, just pointing out what he didn't like about it. Now, I have had plenty of Regional Managers over my very long career at Card Factory, and picking favourites is not a new thing, it happens on every region and by every Regional Manager but by far, my last Regional Manager was the worst for this, and I really do not think that this is how a region should be run - everyone should be treated as equals regardless of who they are, what store they run or how much they cosy up to their boss. The second reason, as I have already mentioned, is the lack of support I (and I know others) received from this manager. I once went seven weeks without hearing from him, this is the person that is supposed to be line managing me and supporting me to run my store. I understand that a job of a regional manager is hard and is very time consuming and I would not expect to hear from my Line Manager, every day nor every week, but to not hear from your Line Manager for over 7 weeks, it really is quite shocking, especially when I know for a fact that some managers were called EVERY day and were even visited most days. Card Factory have been very open about supporting their people recently and have said their is a massive focus on this, not on this region. I know others feel the same but are probably too worried to speak out while they still work there. - Myself and my colleagues understood that we were in a Customer Service role and that the customer came first, however Card Factory's insistence that we offer EVERY customer additional sales had become borderline obsessive. If I was pestered the way we were made to pester customers when I went in to a store, I would turn around and leave. But no, we were forced to offer every customer an additional item, no matter what they were buying, so tell me if somebody has had a death in the family and is buying some sympathy cards, what the hell are we supposed to offer with that?? That being said, it really astounds me then that we were spoken down to by Regional Managers when our Average Units or Average Spend didn't meet their requirements. It got to the point that on conference calls, our Regional Manager would not care about showing his disappointment in us if our results as a region were in a negative, not great to hear when everyday you come in and work yourself to the bone for a company that seemingly doesn't think you are doing enough. - My final point (believe me there are more, but I would go on for years) is loyalty and gratitude. I like to pride myself on the length of service I gave to Card Factory but what I have realised is that you really are just a number to the company and to your managers. I never wanted a fanfare when I left the company but a simple thank you would have been nice. When I say I made myself unwell for the company sometimes, I am not exaggerating. Even my own line manager could only manage a phone call to say bye, not even a visit to the store to see if I was leaving it in a good way - but then again I hadn't seen him since March so I wasn't expecting it. There were times in my Card Factory career when I was managing 3-4 shops, when I was taking on additional responsibilities to support whatever region I was on, when I have opened new stores and closed old ones but this is all completely forgotten when that leavers form is submitted. Don't fret though, because if you are the minority that is in a Regional Manager's clique, I'm certain that you will never be forgotten.

Poorly managed with barely enough budget from head office to keep the lights on. I know most people come away from a job bad mouthing the company but anyone with an ounce of sense could walk in and see it was clearly a shambles. My 'management training ' consisted of showing my how to do a transaction on the till which took all of 30 seconds then I was left to serve customers immediately after that for the next two days, Very small number of staff and the only full timers seem to be management. I would start my shift at 915 where they had one member of staff on the till. 3 hours later that staff member was already cashing up to go home leaving three of us to face rush hour. I'm not exaggerating for effect. I was only there for training, so if I wasn't there, it would have been TWO members of management to face rush hour alone. You don't have to have management training to know that you should rota your part time staff to come in at the busy hours to support the other staff! AWFUL ALLOCATION OF STAFF You are only allowed 30 mins to eat and the breaks were scheduled so poorly that we would have to wait until the next part timer had come in ( nearly 6 hours into the shift) then take turns. Since I came in after the other two managers (15 mins later ) I had to go last, so would have to wait another hour. First thing I noticed in my branch was the appalling state the store was in. The manager said he'd been there two years but 'hadn't had a chance to clean things up' but it takes two seconds to pick a shredded, mouldy old box up from the floor. Stock was cluttered with old boxes and various paper/ cardboard that was collecting dust. The staff room was a dingy little back room that may have been a toilet at one point. The building looked like it hasn't seen any maintenance or upkeep in years. The floor has chunks missing and used sugar packets that had been trampled into the floor to the point there were now fused into it. May have well have sat in a changing locker for the 30mins, would have been a bit more pleasant. It may seem nice enough looking when you walk into a card factory but that's where the effort stops with the company. walk past the 'staff only' door and it's all running on just enough steam to get by. The company spends the exact amount just to get customers in and not a penny more. Even the shirt I was given was an old one left by someone who had walked out before me, they didn't have one in my size. (L) staff were nice enough but mostly full of women in their fifties who were in for 2-3 hours and gone. the rest were nice, but, and without sounding nasty, seemed like they probably wouldn't get by in a more professional company so put up with everything and got on. One manager had the communication skills of a potato. Was shocking. A customer came up to him to say a few nice words about a member of staff and he sort of squirmed, awkwardly smiled and looked at the floor. probably got his job because people would put up with this company left, so he got promoted. Could see he didn't have a good relationship with his staff. some ex employees come away bitter about a company being more about profit than people and usually it's not as bad as they make out, usually due to some kind of fall out with management but I can honestly say that it couldn't be truer about Card Factory. Only consider the option of working here either if you're part time and want some beer money and your shifts wont be long enough to notice how badly its run or if you're on the brink of homelessness and have kids to feed