For a brand billed as a "fun", "delicious", and "warm", the Insomnia employee's experience is anything but. While my perspective is singular insofar as it is individual, it is clear that it is far from exceptional. Rather, dysfunction and disregard for employees is the rule. To begin with, only one other review here does a certain fact justice: There are cameras positioned throughout the store, especially the areas where only employees can congregate, which feed to an unknown location, watched by a "few people" (I am variously told, never by anyone with any specificity) who write the store up for "violations" that range from delivery drivers covering their shirt's logo with their coats in freezing weather, employees eating "behind the line of service", failure to have your company hat on at all times, etc. These are termed "security violations" (as if it were a matter of safety), but should there ever actually be a breach of security at the store (e.g. a drunk guy walked through the back door on St. Patty's Day--harmless but potentially dangerous), you will hear nothing from the guys behind the cameras.
If you remarked "eating on the job is unsanitary", you would be correct--if you did so *while* preparing food, or didn’t wash your hands afterwards. However, we are provided a table and chairs in the back where we can sit, and would (presumably) be intended to eat, but we have incurred many a violation for eating at that very table. Furthermore, we are *never guaranteed a break under any circumstance*. That is, where other food service/retail jobs accord their employees a modicum of respect in allotting them a *scheduled* 30-min meal break for a shift of at least 8 hrs (i.e., there is someone to work in that person's place while they are on break), Insomnia is no such company. The COO will comment that this isn’t true ("we follow all local labor laws") but it is not up for debate. I worked at Barnes and Noble previously (a job not half as physically demanding), and I was always guaranteed a 30-min meal during which I would clock out, could leave the store, obtain food, consume it, and return, and the store would be adequately staffed that someone could fill in for me during my absence. Insomnia *does not do this*. It is true that no one will say you can’t leave to get food, if others can cover for you “real quick”, but when you are a PM shift lead scheduled to run the entire store for 8-10 hrs on a busy night, you just will not eat. In my situation, this was admittedly exacerbated because a "colorful" manager was fired after only two months of work (it was gross incompetence to have promoted them in the first place), and in the time since (another two months) there has been no replacement, as well as another shift lead being fired, and another (our best) quitting, because she was rightfully outraged by Insomnia’s disrespect towards its workers. While this may seem a "one-off" case (I am anticipating the COO's hasty response), a cursory glance at other lengthy reviews on this site will reveal that this is *routine*. My location alone will have seen 4 managers within 2 years, and it is simply a lousy environment psychologically speaking.
Running the store comprises filling deliveries, attending to in-store customers, and closing down at 3am. Sounds simple, but almost all the tasks associated with this are very time-inefficient. Scooping ice cream is the slowest of all. Combine that with handling money/change, ice cream toppings, and brownies baked to order, and you still have to keep track of how many cookies you have left. The latter would be important, if you ever had any time to bake cookies between deliveries and customers. That back-and-forth happens nonstop on a busy night from 7pm past midnight. And it’s true that on some slow days, you can have a “break” every ten minutes. But your position is often never covered to allow you to go get food to eat, and anyway, where would you eat it? Can’t eat behind the line. The unspoken solution to this problem, all the way up to mid-level management, is to just eat off-camera when you can. For my store I can say there is at least a pretty big blindspot, but not where the table is. I’ve heard some stores have no blindspot at all. And anyway, the fact we are even discussing how to break rules that shouldn’t exist in the first place just to allow human beings to eat (so they can actually work) is ridiculous.
As for their actual cookie business, it’s the definition of price-gouging. In my area, “deluxe” cookies are already $3, and I’m told they are raised a fix percentage every summer. I suppose all’s fair in love and business, but when I consider that in combination with the general attitude coming from the company’s management towards its employees, and recognize that I am paid barely over $10/hr to run around this store like a chicken with its head cut off just to--let’s be honest--rip people off for mass-produced sugar bombs (little known, but Insomnia does not manufacture its own cookies, it appears to buy them en masse from davidscookies.com), it would leave a bad taste in anybody’s mouth. After the store is closed, if you haven’t already had time to accomplish the cleaning, have fun with that. Then you are responsible to take the cash deposit for the day to the bank. That’s right, at ~4am.
What I am most trying to get across with this review is that what appears on its face to be a jovial, easy-paced, friendly work environment is actually a nightmare, and is actually a lot more work than it seems. Combine that with the terrible management, and you will frequently be left holding the bag when the store isn’t staffed or stocked, due to no fault of your own. For a job that is overall intended to be temporary by most who hold it, you end up having to do a lot of Insomnia’s dirty laundry. I have been asked to take deliveries myself on multiple occasions (something I assume shift leads are legally/contractually not supposed to do, for liability reasons) when there were not enough drivers due to poor hiring/scheduling practices. I was not compensated for this, nor was I able to keep credit tips or delivery fees, because these are tied to the driver through the computer system, where I am not registered as a driver. The funny thing is, though I know this is “against the rules”, I obliged when asked by the regional director, and I am unsure whether his superiors would actually have a problem with it if they knew. In all likelihood, they do know and don’t care at all, or even directly ordered that I be asked to take deliveries. On another occasion, I was asked on a moment’s notice to drive an hour and a half away to another store to pick up three boxes of chocolate chunk cookies, because our (improperly promoted) manager didn’t order enough. This wasn’t entirely their fault, as a promotional delivery deal for chocolate chunk cookies had really exploded and we sold much more than usual, so I felt comfortable doing it to help my manager, and though I was compensated for the driving hours, I was never approached about gas compensation or anything. That is my own stupid fool fault for not ensuring it would be compensated beforehand, but these events should paint the general picture quite well--Insomnia is willing to ask as much of its employees as it can get away with, and in some cases this is made a condition of employment (e.g., a former driver-turned-shift lead had requested a specific regular availability so he could engage in his preferred recreation, a gaming group with his friends in the evenings on certain days of the week, but on multiple occasions he was forced to work later than had been agreed, due to Insomnia’s irregular scheduling, and I overheard the manager being told that by the regional director if he didn’t comply, he ought to be fired outright). As such, good, hard-working employees go out of their way repeatedly for the company, and repeatedly get burned.
Even all that aside, I am realizing there are significant negative mental health effects of working here. Of course the late-night cookie business attracts certain personalities to begin with, and I am no exception as a night owl, but as another review on this site also attests, the late-night hours and lack of normal day-time activity (for those of us working as close to full-time at Insomnia as we can) makes for miserable, emotionally unstable and volatile employees. The behavior of some of my since-fired coworkers does not at all surprise me in the context of our work environment. The company demands profits, the customer demands cookies, and you are helpless but to shell them out as fast as you can. After a few days of 5pm-4am on end, you will feel your psyche fraying and your body protesting, despite the fact that all you’re doing is “baking cookies”. As a final word on this already huge review, my point is really that yes, while it is our choice to work in this environment for our present reasons, whatever they may be, the kind of strain we face as employees is not only not addressed by management, but ignored and exacerbated, and there is no attempt at understanding or compromise beyond the empty, shallow, sycophantic words of the COO as he pathetically, legalistically responds to every honest review on this site. Insomnia would be a joke if this dysfunction were still funny to me. Now it’s just a walking nightmare, and I won’t be much longer for it. I just hope this review serves as ample warning for anyone considering even a short-term stint at this company.
P.S. One more small thing to keep in mind--this is all coming from someone who has no school schedule. I work at Insomnia now only because I have had a hard time finding a “real job” after college that appeals to me in the short term. If you are a student with actual time constraints, Insomnia’s inconsiderate scheduling and management will likely shaft you even harder than it has shafted me. Do not consider Insomnia if you are a student. They talk up their scheduling flexibility, but they are blowing smoke. I witnessed it firsthand with all my coworkers, most of whom are students at the local university. Do. Not. Work. Here.
