Great place to gain sales experience, but don't count on it for a career.
Pros
-Great sales experience.selling product for a company that prides themselves on being very service oriented. -Opportunities for advancement are available. -Good system of inventory distribution. -Benefits are good, Blue Cross/Blue Shield Insurance, vacation and sick pay.
Cons
-Too many other non-sales related things that have to be done (deliver and set up product, receive.transfer merchandise, collections, etc.) Not strictly a sales job. -Strategic accounts guys are worthless and are of little help on major accounts. -Commission and pay structure is horrible, too many factors go into how one gets paid. -No accountability to anything that goes on, either on the store level or on the corporate level. -Part timers are limited to 18 hours, How can one live, only working 18 hours a week? -Little to no training in the beginning, Thrown into the fire to fend for yourself. -Difficult to be competitive with other distributors, due to mandatory margins being set by upper level management. -Shipping added to invoice to recoup internal freight costs. -As a manager the only way to make money is to land a large account which gives you large growth, but if growth falls off pay is drastically affected. -Turnover is extremely high due to low wages (this affects customers a great deal, every few months they must get reacquainted with a different OSP) -Company does not provide uniforms, yet expects you to dress in Fastenal blue. -Understaffed stores and stores which are too spread out, serving too small of markets. -Many times product is not in stock. The closest distribution hub is in Atlanta and out of stock on a multitude of items that must be pulled from Indianapolis, which increases the shipping time to the store. -Christmas bonus consisted of candy and snacks shipped to the individual stores.
