Feels like a top heavy company that pays no attention to employees in the stores. - Anonymous employee Guitar Center Employee Review

2.0
5 Oct 2011
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

The people you work with, the vendor reps that stop through and say hey, you meet a lot of cool people with similar interests.

Cons

Working in the stores in general, everybody is spread way too thin. Every year payroll budgets get smaller and smaller, and it's getting to the point that every employee is frustrated on a regular basis. A good amount of customers aren't even being helped because there aren't enough people to help them which is of no fault to the employees. Commission structures changing constantly, which always result in a pay cut for even top performers. An operations staff that has entirely way too much on their agenda, no incentive or motivation to work harder, pay their employees the least amount as possible, and generally take the brunt of every downside of the business. Random corporate employees that demand unimportant tasks to be done in an unconvenient timeline, just because they say so.

Explore other reviews about Guitar Center

5.0
16 July 2025
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Management takes good care of you

Cons

No complaints that I can think of

1.0
21 Apr 2026
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

- Plenty of capable individual contributors doing real work. - The brand and the business itself are legitimate — the problems are organizational.

Cons

- Senior leadership is politically driven rather than outcome-driven. Strategic initiatives stall out, and leaders spend more energy assigning or shifting blame than actually diagnosing and fixing problems. - Some parts of the org operate on deference to the top. Honest assessments get softened into whatever narrative leadership wants to hear, which makes real cross-functional work difficult. - Senior leaders do not consistently advocate for their own teams. When things get political, self-preservation takes precedence over backing the people underneath, and capable managers end up exposed.

2
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