This was the first job I hated. - Head Cashier PetSmart Employee Review

1.0
11 Aug 2017
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

-seeing animals -positive interactions with customers/coworkers -fairly consistent schedules

Cons

-Customers were AWFUL. I've worked in several customer service jobs, but for some reason they were terrible here. You constantly have to deal with fraudulent returns and people who think they are better than you. -Horrible training. They make you watch videos for like 6 hours and then that's it. My first day training as a cashier, my manager said she likes to just have people jump in. They had someone else who worked there for 2 weeks show me how the cash register worked, and that was it. -Managers all said different things. One would tell me I was doing something wrong, when another manager told me to do it that way. -They say that you should never tell a customer "I don't know." I took this to heart. I don't like lying to people, so I would find a manager if I didn't know an answer. They got annoyed that I would always come to them for help, but I was never trained in all the questions that customers would ask. Customers consistently ask you questions that should be asked of a veterinarian, and managers expect you to give them an answer. I personally witnessed several managers give customers bad animal advice simply so they would buy something. -All the company cares about is MONEY, MONEY MONEY. I originally wanted to work here because of all the great work PetSmart Charities does. I quickly learned it is all a marketing scheme. You would get in trouble if you weren't selling something to every customer that walked through the door because they have monitors above the door that count each customer that walks in. They compare the amount of customers to the amount of transactions in a day, and expect unrealistic sales. -When I became full time, they NEVER told me what that meant. I simply thought it meant I would get 40 hours a week, but it also meant that if I was sick one day, you have to make up for it later in the same week. You cannot go below 36 hours in the workweek. This was extremely frustrating because my part-time coworkers were consistently getting 4-8 hours a week, and I couldn't give them any of my shifts, even if I wanted to.

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5.0
4 May 2026
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CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Fun, welcoming, easy, flexible, growth

Cons

Weekends, slow, customers, busy, fast pace

1.0
2 June 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

The company pushes for more and more from the bottom level employees without better pay. I worked there before the restructuring and; not much can make me cry, but working here sure did, even back then. I can’t imagine how anxiety inducing it must be to work there now. Animal welfare is a complete non-concern. The only thing that’s pushed is sell, sell, sell. It’s borderline dystopian. Bad management seems to be a common issue, not only from my experience, but many others’ as well. I worked until I was an exhausted sweaty mess to make sure everything in pet care or, when I groomed, the salon, was cleaned to perfection as expected of me (and I reiterate: “me,” because these standards were not expected of my co-workers, just me) and overall felt very unseen. The only times I did feel “seen,” was when mistakes were made. Work was treated like boot camp. A co-worker that was subtley targeting/bullying me, and even started rumors accusing me of racist remarks(!!!), was promoted and anything I reported was downplayed because they were friends with the assistant manager. Working here was an overall traumatizing experience.

Cons

Employees are expected to be work-robots

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PetSmart Response
3w
We’re disappointed to hear that your experience didn’t reflect what we aim to create for our associates, and we appreciate you taking the time to share your feedback. We invite you to contact the CareSmart line at 1-800-738-4693 so we can learn more and see how we can support you. Thank you.
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