Panera Bread reviews

3.4

49% would recommend to a friend

(18,777 total reviews)
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Paul Carbone

40% approve of CEO

33% positive business outlook

Panera Bread has an employee rating of 3.4 out of 5 stars, based on 18,777 company reviews on Glassdoor which indicates that most employees have a good working experience there. The Panera Bread employee rating is in line with the average (within 1 standard deviation) for employers within the Restaurants & Food Service industry (3.4 stars).

Reviews by job title

19K reviews
2.0
Feb 12, 2021

Worst Job I’ve Ever Had

Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

You get to stuff your face with tons of bagels that get sliced wrong and sip on free drinks all day. You’ll gain $50,000lbs.

Cons

They didn’t pay women and men the same for the same job. I was hired at $7.45 an hour and my male counterparts with equal experience were getting $8.45 and $9.45. You have to work there for years to get any sort of raise. The managers are in and out of there every month or so, and they all want you to do things differently. The machines never work. They give you two pitchers for blenders and in one you can only use almond milk, so essentially you have one pitcher to make every iced coffee drink and smoothie order that comes in which is virtually impossible. The customers are EVIL and management just enables them instead of standing up to them. I had a creepy manager once have some weird fetish for making the girls clean (specifically) the mens bathroom. People would no call no show 24/7 and never get in trouble, leaving the 1-2/15 employees who actually tried to do their job keeping up with the rest of everyone’s slack. The timer in the drivethru was insanely stressful. Managers harped on us getting our times down all the time, no matter if we had a difficult customer come through with $300 order, three cooks not show up, and a broken computer for taking orders. I cried all the time after work from how despicable I was treated. Never again.

3.0
Jan 9, 2021
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

My coworkers are awesome and and the job is fun when doing production, service, or BOH shifts. The discount is more than half of the price for food. Collective tips are added to non-management employee's paychecks and it can add up when customers are feeling generous after receiving good service.

Cons

I advise prospective employees to ask for a decent starting rate and get to know your managers under pressure before deciding to stay after 60 days. The pay is too low for the amount of work expected. As a manager, even I feel underpaid. And I feel bad for my associates who work hard to make the store look and feel good for our customers when they make only a little above minimum wage. It's crazy how a company that is so prideful about customer warmth and a positive work environment seems to take advantage of all of its employees.

4.0
Jun 10, 2019
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

The people were the best part. Everyone acts like a big family. The job itself is not too difficult and there is always something to do, whether it's prepping, cleaning, serving customers, or making food. The store management was always helpful and flexible and tried their best to make their team happy.

Cons

The corporate standards are exacting to an almost impossible degree. The mandate that food needs to be prepared and served in under 3 minutes creates an incredibly stressful atmosphere, especially since Panera prides itself on having good quality "fast" food. The company's focus on customer reviews also created a lot of stress and tension for my cafe. It was clear to me that everyone in the cafe was doing their best every day to give customers a good experience, but you can't please everyone, especially when your cafe is one of the busiest around. I wish that upper management didn't breathe down our managers's necks because it created a tense and stressful atmosphere for everyone and impacted team morale. Also, there was little room for salary advancement in my cafe because upper management had put a a freeze on raises.

Viewing 79 - 81 of 18,777 Reviews

Glassdoor has 19,074 Panera Bread reviews submitted anonymously by Panera Bread employees. Read employee reviews and ratings on Glassdoor to decide if Panera Bread is right for you.