Company on the decline - Marketing Program Manager Office Depot Employee Review

2.0
Apr 19, 2018
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

In my experience through two different departments and several groups, my teams were filled with highly talented and future focused people that honestly wanted to make a difference at OD and help the company succeed. Given this 33 year old company has been in a downward spiral the last 4 years or so this was meaningful. I had an awesome team and my manager was A+, a true leader. The campus itself is beautiful and the workspaces are adequate. There are a ton of conference rooms, "lounges" and an outdoor area where you can bring your laptop and do some work if you need a break from your cube. There is an onsite cafeteria with average food (overpriced really but convenient) and coffee/snacks. Probably the best food perk isn't even on campus, it's next door in the new plaza that was built (Chipotle, Fresh Market, Habit Burger, etc). If you're good at what you do and able to network within the company, there are opportunities afforded to you. I know some other reviews here said the opposite but in my experience it's possible. The new CEO has the right vision I feel. The pivot to a more services based offering is needed as the office supply industry, at least at a big box level, is dying. Given he has a tech background it's a big benefit. Compensation, Benefits and PTO are good and fair. It's a Fortune 500 company in South Florida which is rare, so the experience is great.

Cons

There are many so here we go.. I'll first start off with the re-orgs. I was with the company for 3+ years and saw 5 re-orgs (4 at corporate). 2 of those were large layoffs (100+ cut). The most recent just affected my dept (marketing). The instability at OD is at such a high level, so think about that when considering taking a job there. No one knows really when the next one will be, despite leadership saying that was the last one. I've seen the same repeated mistakes with each layoff: Get rid of high paid Directors, Sr Directors, VPs and anyone making a salary at the threshold the management consulting firm determines, shrink down the groups, bring in outside execs. The problem with that is by getting rid of these Directors, etc you're getting rid of institutional knowledge which set us waaaay back and left us worker-bees to pick up the pieces and figure things out which was totally unfair. There have also been a large number of talented people leaving on their own given the instability. I saw very little positive sales weeks/months/quarters in my time there, so that says something. The new senior leadership brought on across the org isn't anything to write home about. I can only really speak directly about new sr. leadership within marketing which I can say is unimpressive. The new vision and strategy was to nearly ax half the marketing department and farm out those duties to the new agency of record. The new CMO and the SVP's she brought in are not the right cultural fit, just really more of the same that we've had. The CMO and new SVPs/VPs took 0 time to get to know the dept and what everyone did. I can see this being difficult when the marketing org was 200 people but we were down to way less than that. The $1 billion acquisition of CompuCom was questionable given their own financial issues so hopefully it works out. BizBox is a joke and I don't see going anywhere. If I run a small business, why would I pay $100/month to have consultants set up and maintain a website when I could spend $100 for the year to set up my own site via Wordpress, Wix, SquareSpace, etc + domain myself? The only plus I see to BizBox is the remodeled "BizBox" stores. They are sharp and the co-working space is cool. That's about the only positive. While strides were made over the years with eComm more needs to be done. Not enough emphasis is being made on digital solutions. They say they can compete with Amazon mainly because OD has brick and mortar but that's a pipe dream and really wished Gerry would stop harping on that. Unless OD gets better in the eComm space they are going to keep declining. The town halls...ugh the town halls. They were bad when Roland was CEO and didn't get much better when he left. Recently they became way to self centered and political with leadership. Another reviewer here described it as to Me Too which is fairly accurate.

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5.0
Mar 10, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Store never get overwhelmingly busy - mix of light/busy days Management does a good job at listening to employees

Cons

Have to push selling product on people that don't want it Schedule may be inflexible

1.0
Jul 8, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

There are no pros to working for this company.

Cons

Low pay, grueling hours, unsafe and toxic work environment. The company does not offer opportunities for its sore employees to advance to the corporate sector; especially if you have a college degree. As a store employee neither you, your expertise and skill set, nor your ideas on how to improve workflow and company culture matter.

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