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    BobbySeriousHamilton Nolan
    12/16/15 11:54am

    I’d be very interested to learn what they pay and what benefits they offer.

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      MConley76BobbySerious
      12/16/15 12:03pm

      I worked there about 7-8 years ago (before the ACA, which is of note here). Everyone was hired in as a part time employee, and made a hair above Ohio minimum wage. Outside yard workers who got their forklift license (my manager told me what answers to give on the writte portion) got a .$.50 an hour increase. There were no benefits, and just because you were called part time doesn’t mean you weren’t asked to work 40+ hours a week. Most departments had a manager, and 2-3 assistant managers who were the full time employees, and I think the assistants made between 9 and 11 bucks an hour, and would often get worked 50+ hours a week, many times going 2-3 weeks without a day off. If you were a part time employee whose department manager didn't like them, you could get your hours cut down to almost nothing on no notice. They would also ignore requests to schedule around your second job, then hold it against you when you asked to switch shifts with another employee.

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      ARP2BobbySerious
      12/16/15 12:06pm

      According to a few sources, years 1-5 employees are $9-10/hr and 5+ years is $12-13/hr. So, probably in the lower half (?) but not quite the worst.

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    25% Meaner Godzooks - BACK TO EVENHamilton Nolan
    12/16/15 12:14pm

    The anti union sentiment in this country is absolutely astounding to me. I live in a area (Chicago) with a great number of union households. (It is very common to see “Stong Union Household” signs posted in the front lawn.) There was a Menards built a few years ago in the neighborhood (by union contractors, not by choice.) I’m sure all the union workers shop there. There’s no solidarity and no real labor movement. Unions are just trying to hand on by a thread to what they have.

    One of our union employees recently bought a Kia sedan. It is virtually identical to the union made Taurus that is assembled within the city limits. His answer was that is was a few thousand cheaper. This worker is a laborer who earns $40/hour in wages, and whose total package in in excess of $62/hour. If someone like this won’t show any kind of union solidarity, what hope is there really?

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      Slow Mutant25% Meaner Godzooks - BACK TO EVEN
      12/16/15 1:10pm

      Even more confusing, I have several friends that work as stagehands in New York. Union Local 1. Every one of them is a republican supporter under “yea, they’re just saying that”

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      2ndFastestDerby25% Meaner Godzooks - BACK TO EVEN
      12/16/15 1:26pm

      I lived in McHenry County for a year and was stunned by the number of Wal-Marts and other big box stores. I kept thinking "I thought this was a pro-union state"?

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    GeorgeGeoffersonLivesHamilton Nolan
    12/16/15 12:02pm

    I love how these corporate-types are always talking about the relationship between employee and employer not needing a middle-man or “outsider” while they won’t say shit unless it goes through a stable of lawyers before it goes out. lol They get to negotiate between themselves and the workers/public/other executives with a whole law department and personal lawyers, but everyone else is just supposed to work it out. lol Never you mind the men behind our curtain. Keep working.

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      ARP2GeorgeGeoffersonLives
      12/16/15 12:10pm

      Don’t forget an HR function, that pretends its on your side, but really isn’t

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      MisterGeorgeGeoffersonLives
      12/16/15 12:53pm

      “We don’t need outsiders. Have a conflict with us? We’d be more than happy to discuss it through binding arbitration, heard by an arbitrator that we pick of course!”

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    Wiz-from-WisHamilton Nolan
    12/16/15 12:12pm

    I had a roommate in college who worked in the Menards distribution center in Eau Claire the summer between my junior and senior years. My friend was hired to run a small fork lift and move shipments onto trucks, part time. One Saturday night, he tripped and fell when leaving a bar, and broke his wrist. Now, it wasn’t a bad break, he had a brace, not a cast, but his doctor recommended he not lift anything heavier than 40lbs or so for 4 weeks. On Monday, minutes after he arrived at work, his supervisor pulled him aside and asked how his wrist was. My friend said it was broken, and though it wouldn’t hurt his ability to drive the forklift, but he might need some help lifting the big boxes/2x4s onto trucks. The supervisor told him to wait while he scurried back into his little office, and after about 5 minutes and a clear phone call up the food chain, the supervisor came out and calmly fired my friend because he couldn’t do his job. Now, maybe that’s kosher for some people, but the callousness of the firing was pretty spectacular. It was literally, “Oh, you’re hurt? Fuck off”

    Menards is a shit-butt sandwich.

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      NotaBabyKillerWiz-from-Wis
      12/16/15 12:28pm

      Maybe your dipshit friend shouldnt get drunk off his ass and stumble out of bars.....

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      Wiz-from-WisNotaBabyKiller
      12/16/15 12:38pm

      Did I say he was drunk? He tripped on the stoop... he had a few beers, sure, but he wasn’t “drunk off his ass” any more than you are a “cogent thinker”

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    RegretsalotHamilton Nolan
    12/16/15 11:55am

    Unsurprisingly, the Republican demigod is also skeevy as fuck.

    “On multiple occasions,” the suit claims, “Mr. Menard touched Mrs. Hilbert and demanded both directly and indirectly, that Mrs Hilbert engage in sexual activities with him and his spouse.” Menard warned there would be “severe financial consequences” if Tomisue (pronounced Tommy Sue) refused him, the suit contends, and some time after this, “Menard made good on his threats and began an orchestrated campaign to cause severe financial consequences against Mrs. Hilbert.”

    and a complete fucking asshole boss.

    Menard’s high-handed manner of running his home improvement chain was detailed in a 2007 feature story for Milwaukee Magazine written by Mary Van de Kamp Nohl. The story reported that Menard’s managers had to sign agreements to be personally penalized for things that go wrong. For instance, having 15 carts in the parking lot drew a $10 fine. And the fine was $100 per minute if they opened a store late.

    Managers were forbidden from building their own homes, to ensure they couldn’t steal any building materials from Menard’s. And Menard hired private investigators to check whether employees who undertake even minor home-improvement projects were using pilfered supplies.

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      m9105826Regretsalot
      12/16/15 12:21pm

      Pretty sure most of those policies aren’t even close to legal.

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      Regretsalotm9105826
      12/16/15 12:27pm

      Even the one about getting employees to double up with you and your wife or face a fine?

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    ChozoRuinsHamilton Nolan
    12/16/15 11:59am

    I worked for Shaw’s Supermarkets for 10 years, half of those in management. We used to have videos shown to us and meetings about how to “watch out for” people coming up from the Massachusetts store trying to get employees to sign up for the unions. Disgusting stuff. Got written up once for refusing to go to the meeting and support the company line.

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      GrumpyEagleChozoRuins
      12/16/15 12:34pm

      Union grocery jobs can be pretty sweet. My husband had one in his high school years (Illinois) and was able to afford a car and college tuition with the flush funds he made arranging fruit and vegetables into attractive pyramids.

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      Max CherryGrumpyEagle
      12/16/15 1:17pm

      Well, if it wasn’t for unions and labor laws, the grocer he worked for would have had 10 year old kids shipped in from India to stock the produce. So, if I have to choose between one or the other.

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    MrsTommyShelbyHBICHamilton Nolan
    12/16/15 12:05pm

    Let’s do an informal poll:

    Reply with any company you have worked for that makes you sit through anti-union propaganda.

    I’ll start:

    The Container Store

    (who just loves their employees so much they made us wear a “We Love Our Employees” t-shirt every Valentine’s Day.)

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      ARP2MrsTommyShelbyHBIC
      12/16/15 12:13pm

      Pier 1 Imports (late 90’s)
      WalMart (late 00’s)
      Target (late 00’s)
      Starbucks- as you’d expect, a lot more feel-good than blatently anti-union (mid 00’s)

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      MrsTommyShelbyHBICARP2
      12/16/15 12:20pm

      See I didn’t think the Menard’s language was particularly blatant. It sounded like exactly what some cheerful actor told me in The Container Store video.

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    OctoberSurpriseHamilton Nolan
    12/16/15 12:09pm

    Guys...guys...lets cut the guy some slack. He is a job creator after all, and doesnt that entitle him to just a small portion of every employees soul and dignity?

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      NicoOctoberSurprise
      12/16/15 12:32pm

      Finally! Someone who understands American Capitalism!

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      Max CherryOctoberSurprise
      12/16/15 1:53pm

      “We cannot negotiate with people who say what’s mine is mine and what’s yours is negotiable” - JFK

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    IAMBlastedBiggsLostBurnerHamilton Nolan
    12/16/15 11:53am

    I remember the occasional Menards reference during the Nelson years on the Satellite of Love!

    (Ed. note—I know this has nothing to do with the story. I just miss the old MST3K. Yeah, I know it's coming back, but there was something about those Nelson seasons that are just impossible to forget...anyway, please continue with your story...)

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      Volante3192IAMBlastedBiggsLostBurner
      12/16/15 12:05pm

      It’s a giant spider invasion of savings at Menards!

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      IAMBlastedBiggsLostBurnerVolante3192
      12/16/15 12:09pm

      That's the best one!! I'm sorry I can't star this, because it deserves about a hundred of them.

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    JorgeHusebyHamilton Nolan
    12/16/15 12:09pm

    The main competition for Menard’s up here is Home Depot, which is also very anti-union. What would you suggest I do when I need to go to one of these stores?

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      25% Meaner Godzooks - BACK TO EVENJorgeHuseby
      12/16/15 12:21pm

      In truth, in the big picture it’s pretty hopeless. I think it’s fair to say that labor movement has moved into autopsy phase.

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      Thaddeus S. VentureJorgeHuseby
      12/16/15 12:26pm

      Here we have Lowe’s and Home Depot - both owned by intolerable pieces of shit. I’m in the same boat - where does a dude buy a shovel without lining some dipshit’s pockets?

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