Tophatter Reviews

4.5

94% would recommend to a friend

(58 total reviews)

Ashvin Kumar

89% approve of CEO

68% positive business outlook

Tophatter has an employee rating of 4.5 out of 5 stars, based on 58 company reviews on Glassdoor which indicates that most employees have an excellent working experience there. The Tophatter employee rating is 27% above average for employers within the Retail and wholesale industry (3.5 stars).

Reviews by job title

58 reviews
2.0
18 July 2018

Don't believe the positive reviews

Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Intelligent, hard-working team members who want to do their best work, and who contribute immensely to the success of the team. If you want a place where you will truly connect with the people, and have fun (numerous outings and celebrations, free food, happy hours and extravagant parties) this is the place for you.

Cons

Notice that the positive reviews follow the negative ones, as though to drown out the negative reviews. This is classic Tophatter - whenever something is “bad”, they bury their heads in the sand and don’t want to face the challenge of truly fixing the problem. This is true just as much of the culture issues, as it is of the business. The CEO is insincere at best, and manipulative at worst. While he pretends to care for people, and displays vulnerability and emotion, he is also (consciously or otherwise) sexist; routinely promoting men over women, and creating circumstances for outspoken senior women leaders to “mutually agree” to leave the company. Multiple senior women on the leadership team have left mostly because the CEO and COO have a difficult time working with strong female leaders. Those women who choose to follow rather than lead, are not rewarded with promotions but rather a sense of job security. Women are also the lowest paid employees on any given team. The business is also suffering. They keep trying the same methods, year over year, to bring in revenue without truly thinking through the ramifications. Another reviewer mentioned the “loyal customers” which is patently false. Just look at Tophatter’s Facebook feed and ads - the products are subpar, cheap and are aimed towards the bargain hunters. Those customers by definition are not loyal. One does have to give kudos to the marketing team for making Tophatter seem like a top-of-the-line ecommerce site. One would think that given all these issues, the team would bring in some outside help to consult and correct. This has not happened (even now as other reviews indicate). The people team is also extremely inexperienced. The one person who did care enough to make changes was also pushed out of the company and - surprise - was a woman.

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Tophatter Response
7y
There are indeed intelligent, hardworking people across the organization. We’re committed to a great employee experience including our office environment, compensation, perks and benefits, and learning & development opportunities. We value the people on our team, and appreciate feedback from current and past employees. We would also like to respond to clarify some facts. In response to the suggestion that “positive reviews follow negative ones,” we don’t request or incent employees to leave positive reviews. Of current employees, approximately one-third of women and one-third of men have earned promotions. We pay based on experience not on gender, and on half the teams the highest paid person is a woman. We appreciate you sharing your experience. If you would like to learn more about recent improvements, our doors are open.
5.0
9 Oct 2017

Scaling up

Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

1. Strong revenue growth and discipline around building a sustainable, profitable business. 2. Culture of performance - given lots of freedom and responsibility 3. Hundreds of millions in annual sales, millions of users, and meaty business/product/eng challenges. 4. "Marketplace of ideas" - employees encouraged to come up with ideas that will move the company forward. Support them with data and you'll get a lot more buy in. 5. Fun, smart folks joining team from large consumer brands, competitive pay, and big new office in San Francisco with snacks, lunch provided 5 days a week, and generous benefits.

Cons

No cons really but for those coming aboard, embrace the culture of freedom and responsibility. Be proactive about seeking guidance. Also there's a refreshingly open communication style of "radical candor" so be ready for open feedback that contributes to a goal of the founders: "to provide the best professional experience of your career".

1.0
17 Mar 2018

Absentee CEO, mismanaged engineering & product teams

Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Good employees and management in buyer support, seller support, accounting, marketing, growth, office management. Office close to caltrain. Leadership outside of CEO, engineering and product is quite good.

Cons

CEO rarely around anymore. Site buggy and ugly. Product team management has no idea how to create a good looking site -- does not have relevant experience or education. Engineering team breaks site and fixes, then goes home. Occasionally adds new features that break site even more instead of fixing old issues that other teams logged years ago. Few opportunities for employees to advance careers -- for the most part employees stuck in roles hired into. No one takes company values (hunger courage mindfulness humility ownership) seriously. Much lip-service given.

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Tophatter Response
8y
Thank you for taking the time to give us your feedback. We regret that your experience at Tophatter does not match our intention of being the most fulfilling place you have ever worked. We value and consider all feedback, and are continuously looking for ways to improve. I invite your further input in-person or via email to me, to our HR team, or exec team. From your post, it sounds like your concerns are mainly with the product development process and your experience could be improved with greater dialogue and understanding. I particularly invite you to contact us regarding living up to our values -- or where you see that failing to happen -- so we can work on improvement there.
Viewing 1 - 3 of 58 Reviews

Glassdoor has 70 Tophatter reviews submitted anonymously by Tophatter employees. Read employee reviews and ratings on Glassdoor to decide if Tophatter is right for you.