Sweetwater reviews

4.0

77% would recommend to a friend

(540 total reviews)
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Mike Clem

88% approve of CEO

72% positive business outlook

Sweetwater has an employee rating of 4.0 out of 5 stars, based on 540 company reviews on Glassdoor which indicates that most employees have a good working experience there. The Sweetwater employee rating is in line with the average (within 1 standard deviation) for employers within the Retail & Wholesale industry (3.4 stars).

Reviews by job title

540 reviews
2.0
Sep 13, 2023

Do NOT Work Here

Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Employee discount is the only real reason to keep working there

Cons

Lack of communication, I had a HR situation with a fellow worker that was blown out of proportion and before I could even defend myself I was told to not be friends with people, that I was too focus on work, and if I was looking for closure that I wasn’t going to find it. I had to go to HR muse about that person because they treated me terribly as retaliation for years, all of that could have been muted by a simple conversation where both sides could vent frustration and move on, but Sweetwater doesn’t value direct communication. HR is for the company not the employees, they held a person back for having seizure disorders, they couldn’t do the photo turning position in the Guitar Gallery because saying that HR is for the company not employees. That employee had to quit because of it. Very two faced company. Favoritism in the work environment, only way to move up is to be friends with management. Management in the Guitar Gallery has no clear vision for how to move up, it’s based off of conjecture, and gets swayed depending on how much you suck up to them, the more direct questions you ask the more vague of a response they give. If you get on there bad side they shadow ban you without you even knowing. Supervisors don’t understand how to properly lead and communicate effectively, lots of cliques. Management only talks and interacts with the workers they like, and as previously stated, those are the people that move up. Take that as you will, if you value your personal freedom, and sanity, avoid working here.

3.0
Nov 17, 2022
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Great pay for the industry in a small city that is very affordable to live. Very efficient systems and infrastructure. You will get to meet a lot of top notch Artists/users of music equipment, make great connections in the audio and music business.

Cons

It's not a boutique. It's not a family. It a giant call center just like any other multi-billion dollar company. They indoctrinate you that everything is the "Sweetwater Difference", but management hired a ton of people from the competition that made it the same just with faster shipping and better software. The benefits are very expensive especially for family coverage. They self insure so everything could be covered with out the hassles but management decided they like making money off the money in the insurance pool rather than taking care of their employees. Management piled on rules and more rules because god forbid they actually have a meaningful conversation with an individual employee. All the potential fun and joy was squeezed out long ago. It's like a giant factory where the machines were replaced by cubicles. Management has a one size fits all style that favors obedience to the rules over any new ideas. The culture is oppressive and stiffling to creativity and individuality. They love hiring the Debt Slaves of recent college graduates with the shackles of their student debt keeping them in their place with mouths shut.

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Sweetwater Response
3y
Thank you for sharing your feedback. Regarding health insurance benefits costs, you can easily check our programs against the national averages provided by the Kaiser Foundation at kff.org. What you'll find is that our employee medical insurance packages are priced anywhere from 10-40% lower than the national averages depending on the level of coverage an employee selects. We regularly benchmark our programs to ensure we are offering our team members good value. In addition, over the past 3 years, we have lowered our employee premiums by 15-30% (depending on the program) while employee premiums nationwide have increased 22%. I understand that health insurance costs are a concern for many and that is why we continue to pay close attention to this to ensure we're offering strong options to all of our team members. - Jeff Ostermann, Chief People Officer
2.0
Feb 28, 2018
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

This job provides great benefits and gains financially if you work hard and put in a lot of hours which is amazing. You can earn a great living quickly if you focus on yourself and no one else.

Cons

Sales Management is the driving force behind watering-down of quality here. They lead from fear of being fired themselves and expect Sales Engineers to do this job from an idealistic perspective rather than a practical one and it causes people to leave the company very quickly because they constantly feel lied to. Training does not prepare you for the actual job and management will use its hands-off approach to watch you get frustrated and leave.

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Sweetwater Response
8y
We're sorry, but this review is just not correct. I have been here for almost 13 years as the head of Human Resources and in that time there isn't a single Sales Manager who has been terminated, had any kind of write up or other disciplinary action, or received anything less than a very good rating. So the idea that managers are "leading from fear of being fired themselves" is, frankly, preposterous. As far as not doing the job from a practical standpoint, scores of the 330+ courses we teach in Sweetwater University are incredibly practical: teaching, training and giving exact pointers on how to build a data base, use our CRM system, track progress, etc. How in the world this comes across as lying to a new hire is beyond us. If we truly were constantly lying to Sales Engineers,, our turnover rate for that job would be extremely high. It is actually single digits, which is fairly unheard in a commission sales environment. Even the reviewer admits that people can have a successful career here and earn a great living quickly. I'm not quite sure how that comes across as lying. --Jeff McDonald, Senior VP of Human Resources
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Glassdoor has 569 Sweetwater reviews submitted anonymously by Sweetwater employees. Read employee reviews and ratings on Glassdoor to decide if Sweetwater is right for you.