Altria Reviews

I worked at Altria full-time for less than a year

Pros – multiple restructures in a very short period. For contructors, there are many chances to obtain a job in a company.

Cons – Employees of Altira faced a log of restrucatures in a short period and it created a very uncomfortable mode for them.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

I worked at Altria full-time for more than 7 years

Pros – Structured training and development program. Flexible work hours. Competitive compensation. Reputable company and work experience. Management is committed to developing their direct reports. There are opportunities to think strategically and make a real impact on the business. Culture is very outgoing and friendly. Very fun job overall.

This is a great place for a recent college graduate to begin a career. Altria looks for smart and outgoing people for their sales force.

Cons – Mobility is must if you wish to advance within the sales force. Corporate HQ is in Richmond, VA (not the most appealing city). A Territory Sales Manager role positions you for little more than sales if you are unhappy with Altria. Other functional experience is necessary to move to another company or to seek a job that is not sales-related. Additionally, multiple initiatives are the norm. There is a lot of pressure to make numbers and balance multiple priorities all the time. Also, management wants TSMs to be strategic, but much of the job is tactical/executional in detail. Management should have more faith in the strategic thinking capabilities of their TSMs.

If you are not promoted within 5 years, pursue an MBA. Also, make sure you are organized. Otherwise, the job can be very stressful.

Advice to Senior Management – Prioritize. Everything cannot be a priority. Give TSMs more responsibility for their business results and don't hold them so accountable for numbers/objectives that are ultimately meaningless. Have more faith in the abilities of your TSMs.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend – I'm optimistic about the outlook for this company

I worked at Altria full-time for more than 10 years

Pros – - Great Friends! I worked at Altria (Philip Morris USA) for over a decade. I made so many life-long friendships.

- Family Orientation. I have a family, and not once did I feel as if my family was unwelcome. They would come to meet for lunch or to say hello to our friends at work. In addition (it's up to manager discretion by the way), there's ample time off and a general understanding that family is priority #1 for most folks, and that your career/occupation/job is the means to continue making family #1.

- Wealth of Experiences: In my tenure there, I had more jobs than years at the company. This wasn't because of 'bad' attrition rates, but rather, the acknowledgement of content mastery and the desire to continue providing challenging experiences.

- Pay is 'good' for the area. At any job, a few 'k' more is always nice, but keep in mind that for the level position for the Richmond area, the pay is very competitive.

- Investment in Leadership. Having left the company, I now look back on the investment Altria makes in Leadership, and it's truly from the 'bottom up'. I cannot even count how many Leadership Seminars, Bootcamps, Excursions, etc. that I experienced over the years. In addition, management truly wants your input, and fully incorporates you into the strategic planning process. All in all, they are FUN, rewarding, and you learn a LOT of transferrable skills.

Cons – - Downsizing. This is the Tobacco Industry. It is in decline. Period. In a declining market, with the overhead of Federal and State cash outlays that increase YoY, it's a tough road. I witnessed three layoff periods, and it was not a happy place to be. As a former employee, the ONLY reason I left was because of this reason, and this reason alone. With downsizing, you constantly wonder when the next round of layoffs will be, and you also witness the shrinking 'opportunity set' of potential positions, both laterally and in advancement.

- 'Good old Boy Network'. This is an 'older' company, and there's a perception that a 'good old boy' network exists(ed) inside the company. If you didn't play golf with the VP of so n' so, then the perception was that you wouldn't be up for the next big promotion.

- Over-reliance on Sales Force. I worked at Headquarters, and witnessed an incredible amount of 'churn' with selected personnel from the Field Sales Force. Granted, that organization is very large, and the top X% of that organization is a large number. However, placing Field Sales Force personnel in 'any' position over and above others that have garnered as much or more success in their respective non-FSF roles is NOT the panacea they are looking for.

Advice to Senior Management – - Be as Transparent as possible with your people, the future of the company, and their future. The people that are there are completely DEDICATED to the company, and to each other. This is VERY hard to find. Transparency is applauded, and respected.

- Shift towards a Meritocracy. I'm not suggesting a pendulum swing here, but instead, put a little more weight during Reviews and advancement planning on truly WHAT the individual delivers against the goals, and HOW. Rely less if Jane Doe is a great schmoozer at an event, or garners cross-functional attention through some theatrics. Rely more on and reward Janet Doe who actually did the work and garnered cross-functional accolades through making systems, processes, and people better.

- Rely less on Sales Force to solve the company's problems. In general, Sales persons are not engineers. They are not creative savants. They do not hold a doctorate in statistics and developed a new coding script for evaluating data. Yes... these can be learned by the brightest of sales persons, but the folks you have that are already doing that type of work have also mastered those skills, and want to keep progressing as well!

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

I have been working at Altria full-time for more than 10 years

Pros – Good salary, benefits and work-life balance

Cons – Very old school. Good old boy network and hard for minorities and women to advance. You have to be part of the in crowd.

Advice to Senior Management – Practice what you preach and reward individuals based on effort not whether you like them or not.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

I have been working at Altria full-time for more than 7 years

Pros – Competitve Salary and Excellent Benefits

Cons – Limited opportunity for upward mobility

Advice to Senior Management – Create senior positions within units

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

I have been working at Altria

Pros – over all wonderful company to work for, but

Cons – if you are young in your 20s and not willing to relocate there really is no upward mobility for you. once management see's that you are young and moldable, you are automatically grouped into a category, which is develop and move forward into another territory. if this is what you want then it really is the perfect company for you.

Advice to Senior Management – not every one wants to relocate, some just want to stay put.

I worked at Altria full-time for more than a year

Pros – Pay is reasonable.
Travel is available.
Good amount of seminars, nice gyms in richmond.
Different companies to go and work for under the Altria umbrella

Cons – Terrible management..
Awful communication.
Declining businesses.
Poor decision making and talent retention.
Long hours required without the compensation for overtime depending on what position you are.

Advice to Senior Management – None.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend – I'm not optimistic about the outlook for this company

I have been working at Altria full-time for less than a year

Pros – Excellent salary for a new college grad, company car and gas, excellent benefit package, business casual dress

Cons – This is NOT professional sales!! If you do not want to be a merchandiser to not apply for this position!!! You will be working with over 100 retailers going around and putting up POS (point of sale...signage), merchandising products on fixtures for top space and new products, repricing signage, looking at sales data to increase market share(yet you dont control pricing, distribution from manufacturer, advertising budget, etc.), and "selling" in new product (really just suggesting it and maybe placing an "e-order" for a couple of cartons of cigs..which RARELY per "sale"/retailer is over $200 total of merchandise). The vast amount of your time will not be selling anything. The company says they are trying to go to a "consultant sales position," but you can't separate what you truly are and what the customer (retailer) sees you as..a merchandiser from the companies idea of "sales." The position once learned (for someone of average intelligence..about 2-5 months) can become very boring and for anyone with more than basic sales (ie: summer sales jobs at the mall and a basic understanding of financial/sales concepts) this position won't be fullfilling. To illustrate this isn't really a professional sales oreinted position...the company feels the most complex financial concept learned is calculating retailers profit margin, penny profit, and mark up. The income is majority base salary (95% of it) and making a decent sales income (over $60k) will require you to move into management (generally at least a minimum of 2 years into your career). Also you have little say where you will be relocated to once promoted. Another HUGE CON is the company hires a lot of kids straight from college and they get stars in their eyes based on position title and base income out the gate...and have little to no practical sales knowledge or ability..therefore they feel selling $150 of goods in a "sale" is setting the world on fire. People also get promoted WAY too fast and without any true management experience or knowledge. Promotion is based on being liked and having a cheerleader mentality, with sales goals being secondary. Everyone talks about getting promoted even at the first training meeting. While it is a good company with great benefits...for anyone with true sales ability or who wants their income/promotion somewhat dependent on their own abilities and merits...stay away.

Advice to Senior Management – Rename the position to "Merchandiser," or redefine the position and hire people with true sales experience (more than working at the mall and getting a good GPA in college). Not promote people within 2 years based on undefined metrics and a popularity contest. Stop trying to release countless variations of the same product..just in different packages with new names...so retailers will actually respect your knowledge instead of seeing you as "pushing product."

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

I have been working at Altria full-time for more than a year

Pros – -High entry level pay (salary started around 56k, at second year 59.5k)

-Quality deferred profit sharing program

-Flexible work schedule (you essentially build your own schedule)

-Approximately 18 paid vacation days not including around 6 company holidays

-Upper management is fairly in tune with how the sales force feels and is sympathetic to the amount of initiatives we have to deal with monthly, however, only minor changes have taken place.

-Upper management are extremely personable, knowledgable, and mostly come from the sales force which is nice to see.

Cons – -Although you are a member of a team "unit" there is no feeling of teamwork or unity

-You will do 95% of your work independently with no direct contact from team members, or managers (This may be great if you have held a job for several years and have mastered time management but for an entry level position there is little to no guidance other than what comes down from HQ).

-Your manager will heavily dictate your success, which sounds obvious, but in theory one should be able to pay their own way based on how this system is structured. Because managers are constantly being promoted and shifted around it is difficult to build a relationship.

-They bait you with talks about promotions but constantly change career advancement opportunities.

-Company sells the idea of their high employee retention rate and small turnover percentages however in the past year they laid off 125 employees which created a 1984 type environment to work in.

-You are essentially crushed with initiatives which is normal of a sales organization of this size with so many operating companies, however, everyone is measured on their ability to "sell in" new products which can be extremely easy in some areas and extremely difficult in others. There is no balancing tool in place to accurately assess an employee's ability to sell. Your territory can make or break you.

-Their seem to be a lot of Unit Managers with their own agendas that put themselves and their personal success above the team's ability to grow and outperform.

Advice to Senior Management – FieldEdge will be one of the most costly mistakes of Altria's future (less lawsuits). This program should have been purchased from an outside CRM company. It is decades behind in its ability to track and record sales, customer information, and give the sales force what they need to sell your product. It may have saved some money in the beginning but considering all of the updates in less than 2 years, it is obvious FieldEdge is in trouble. Giving employees more technology to sell in addition to their laptops (tablets) is a mistake. Your sales force is aging and they can hardy use FieldEdge. You will just be placing already flawed software, into extraneous hardware, into the hands of a generation that has no interest in adapting to this type of technology.

I don't mean to rant because in all honesty, upper management are great, I think they just have a lot of "Yes Men and Yes Women" Unit Managers looking for a promotion and no one is telling them what is actually occurring in the store with our customers.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend – I'm not optimistic about the outlook for this company

I worked at Altria as an intern for more than a year

Pros – Security, Payment, Advancement Opportunities, Exciting Industry, your own car, you meet a ton of people, respectable company, practices what they preach

Cons – Monotonous, can get stuck, have to go into gas stations every day, tobaccoo, if you want to move up you have to put in crazy work in 1st year, sales stuff is pretty cut and dry

Advice to Senior Management – Limit time sales people spend in gas stations...those places get pretty disgusting. Also you need to realize that some of the C-Store owners really just don't want your product, so stop pushing so hard

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend – I'm optimistic about the outlook for this company