Pros
The philanthropic arm of REI does a lot of amazing work to protect open spaces, public lands and our national and state parks. The products REI carries are top quality and the level of customer service provided is rarely seen in retail. When it comes to environmental conservation and advocacy REI is on the cutting edge.
Cons
The only real issue I ever had with REI is the retail strategy used when it came to employment. Employment with REI is kind of perceived as a privilege. There's this attitude sometimes that because of the great employee discounts they offer that everything else can get overlooked. It's an amazing job if you don't really need to make a living. Perfect for students and the semi-retired who have loans or other forms of income to rely on. In 14 months of employment with REI I never once received any consistency in scheduling, I never "qualified" for access to health benefits or PTO, and I never once had any opportunity to work full-time. My hours would fluctuate, sometimes wildly, and I simply never felt very appreciated or adequately compensated. It surprised me when I realized early into my employment with REI that they use similar hiring and staffing techniques that any Target or Walmart would use. Rather than having a solid full-time work force, REI relies on leaning very hard on management while using a large part-time staff who may never qualify for benefits. If I were still in school this would not have been a problem but now that I have a degree and student loan debt I simply could not afford to remain employed at REI. I voluntarily left REI for full-time work at a higher wage.