Pros
If you have no other options or experience, it's not a bad place to get your start.
Cons
Leadership gets overpaid to set unattainable goals and ignore feedback from their subordinates. Planning department expects assistant and associate planners to do the workload of what used to be 3 separate roles. Upper management is constantly told that the workload is too much. Instead of fixing the issue, they repeat their "Bealls is a great place to be" spiel and find ways to tack on even more responsibilities. Merchandise department is the same. Merchandise Assistants are paid next to nothing, are overworked to the bone, and many are treated like garbage by their buyers. There was recently a mass exodus of Merchandise Assistants. Instead of doing anything, i.e. lowering responsibilities or increasing pay, they organize a mediocre breakfast and praise the merchandise assistants for their hard work and expect everyone to forget about it. Assistant buyers work 60+ hour weeks with no overtime and measly salaries. Work from home is determined by the head of departments. Planning gets to work from home Wed-Fri but marketing is still debating on whether they should dedicate a WFH day even though 95% of work could easily be done from home. Everyone I knew there was drowning in responsibilities when I left. If you accept a position at bealls, expect your responsibilities to triple within 4 months and your pay to stay virtually the same for years. The CEO has been making questionable decisions. We were in a hiring freeze and he decides it would be best to spend an excessive amount of the company's time and resources on changing the name and signage of stores. He is surrounded by yes-men/women who are too afraid to refuse or even question his decision making. Unsurprisingly, the company was struggling to meet their goals, and he decided then would be the best time to start not one, but two podcasts.
