I worked for Ashley furniture in Las Vegas Nevada and want to confirm the accusations in regards to free labor and being required to provide the free labor the day after Thanksgiving.
Even though there has been reports of the Michael Jedlowski / Southwest Furniture requiring their sales associates to provide a helper the day after Thanksgiving is continuing as of Thanksgiving 2009. As stated before the sales staff was required to provide a name of the person you were bringing in the day after Thanksgiving several weeks in advance. I asked if this was mandatory or optional and was told by the sales manager and the store manager that it was mandatory. I responded really Hmmmm!!!
I stated that I was new to Las Vegas and my wife worked and all my friends in
Las Vegas had jobs and but that I would ask around. I also asked if I could not find anyone to come in and help what would happen. I was told that if I did not have a helper that day that i would be sent home for the day. At that point I asked for them to provide a Company Memo stating that. I also asked if they were planning on paying the helpers for that day and they said no but that I could pay them if I wanted. They asked me why I wanted a copy of the memo and i told them that if i lost my job or was sent home i wanted proof to show my wife of what was going on and that my next step was to contact a lawyer. If I was sent home or fired for not providing a free worker for the company that what they were requiring was illegal. I also asked them to show me where in the company handbook did it state that at times Ashley employees would be required to provide helpers to work for free or the employee would be required to pay them.
I also explained to them that I had been a store manager for many years and also a company owner and that what they were requiring they could not get away with. They said look we are going to be so busy you are gonna want a helper. I asked what are they going to help me do.
I have been in sales for 26 years and let me say this the way that company does paperwork and if the paper work is not done exactly right you can loose your commission over an error for example miss spelling words on the hand written copy of the sales order or keying the *sku that they require a gazillion of to help the delivery/warehouse get the order right but thaat is another story of this screwed up company. If any of these thing were wrong you loose the sale and it goes to the house. Now your helper does not know the show room floor they may be able to sell but they basically can not really do anything without me there so what is the point.
Michael Jedlowski firmly believes that every customer that walks through the door want someone right behind them and shadowing them and pestering them the whole visit in the store so he much rather have unqualified untrained people in his showrooms tagging along with potential buyers. Of course for you to become a sales associate for Michael Jedlowski you have to go through a 2 week traing class regard less of your experience because he wants to make sure you know their paperwork system and their product but like I said he wants untrained people working with his customers of and yes they are his customers as he says.
Well back to that day I came in had no helper and actually did not even try to get a helper along with several other sales associates and i actually told them a few days before that i wanted to get sent home and have the one day suspension in writing when I reported to work the day after Thanksgiving. Needless to say I did not get sent home and we were so slow most of the helpers that did come in at 5:30 am went home by 10:00 am. The funny thing was I wrote more business without a helper then anyone that did have a helper. My opinion is that Michael Jedlowski/Southwest Furniture RE: Ashley Furniture attitude is the economy in this country is so bad and there are tons of people looking for work that he does what he wants and doesnt care because if you do not like it leave there an tons of others out their waiting to take your place.
The stories could go on forever on the unfair and just on the border of criminal of actions this company does. What is sad is that Ashley Furniture Homestore Industries turns a blind eye to what he does and at times ruins the reputation of their product and image. Mind you that I am only refering to this franchise within the Ashley Furniture Company
To give you a slight insight to this company I during my time working for this company It never ceased to amaze me what they would do next and the quality of some of their management was good but some of the management was down right embarassing and totally unqualified to be dealing with the public.
If the state sent in secret undercover workers who recoreded everything that goes on within this company they would shut the opperation down and or there would be so many fines impossed Mr. Jedlowski could want to leave town. Knowing that he can not be a honest business man he would be better of leaving town. One of his sales managers quotes is Lie cheat steal just do not get caught. Well let me tell you people get caught in that company all the time and there is never any punishment. During my time at Ashley Furniture I saw the company train in my training class their was 18 people by the tenth month I was the last one out of that class and I saw just in my store another 10 get trained and one I think is still left then another class there was 12 more none of those are left then I saw another 5 and 1 is left and that was the managers buddy So its not hard to see that Ashley Furniture is not a very good place to work for if it is owned Michael Jedlowski
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