cashier

baker

butcher

line cook

grocery associate

Freson Bros.

I will start off by saying, this place is great for a first job for kids that are looking to get into the food trades and a good place to learn about food based trades like Chef/Baker/Butcher. Also is really great place to meet new people.

But that being said that's all I can say is good about this place. The Management/Leadership is Extremely egotistical and has extreme favoritism issues. This company doesn't do enough employee evaluations or give constructive criticism so lazy workers run rampant and go undisciplined. Department managers are basically glorified supervisors, they can't out right fire someone, they can write people up but that never resulted in anything. Seen so many issues with lazy workers not getting any sort of consequence which resulted in departments always falling behind. I've seen lazy workers complain about to much work in a day behind their dept managers backs because they are purposely going slow all day, then get OT from the store manager for being lazy basically. This caused a very toxic favoritist work environment. 

The department "Manager" position is a revolving door. The expectations are to high a lot of the time and I've seen a lot of managers leave because they are basically living their whole life at work. I'm talking 60-70 hours a week when only paid for 40 and no OT. I get some people love to work and they dedicate their lives to the work, which is fine but most people work to live, not live to work.

Overall the work itself was fine and the people I worked closely with were awesome. But the Management needs A LOT of work. My advice would be is use this place as an opportunity to learn and grow and use their apprenticeship programs for school. I would not treat this as a mean all end all. People don't quit jobs, they quit bosses. They need to understand the difference between a boss and a leader.

My experience with this company was pretty rough. During grand opening, it was so busy that no one could keep up with production to a point there was not enough space for everyone to do prep properly or safely.

Supervisors had obvious favourites and would create massive double standards. You are told one thing and witness the exact opposite. Manager would show up late daily or not at all when compared to their posted schedule.

You are scheduled 9 hours a day for full time, with a 1 hour UNPAID break. However you are told from HR & the company that you are also entitled to x2 fifteen minute breaks. Certain departments are either too scared to take them or are allegedly told they are not allowed.

Some food is not made according to their recipes. A staff member put vanilla yogurt in potato salad one day. There is little to no care about food safety standards. The counters were trying to sell 7-8 day old food, to a point it was smelling bad. I caught a head manager with food from the smoker that sat out for over 4 hours at room temp. 

Your vacation pay is accrued and not paid out on your cheques.

The job was starting to be nice when I had a solid routine going, but then the schedule completely changed after a few months and days off were not 2 days at a time. 

I believe I learned once again how not to run  a kitchen and that you can streamline many tasks to make things more efficient, but that's not the Freson Bros way. 

There were issues with communication (the rules changed every day and if you took a week off, the whole work system was different by the time you came back), management was kind and understanding but not very good at getting back to you (phone calls, texts not being returned, being promised answers to your questions but never got any).

We used to get free coffee and soft serve but that stopped, used to be able to eat lunch at the restaurant but then it got changed to mandatory eating in the staff room, no one ever told me what the rules were for breaks and everyone I asked gave a different answer. All of this could already be different by now.

Hardest part of the job was just how strenuous and emotionally draining it was. Got told to do different things by different people and sometimes it was hard to do the main part of my job because I was always running around for people who ranked above me. Got minimum wage, the under-18s all got paid the absolute minimum possible (13$/hr)

Best part was that generally, coworkers supported each other and while there were high expectations and confusing standards, it's not like you could get fired for making a small mistake. There's a steep learning curve but coworkers and managers are there for you while you learn and some mistakes are expected.

As a cashier I worked with a lot of staff from the other departments. The staff and management were very friendly and welcoming. Working as a cashier I found it wasn't too hard to stand for the 5 hours I worked. Repetitive motion of scanning and bagging items never bothered me as we were able to switch between scanning and bagging throughout the shift. There were some light duties to do while on shift when there were fewer customers. We had to sweep the till lanes, dust the display shelves, and wipe down our area. I learned how to be quick and accurate on the till while scanning items. Management was always friendly and genuinely interested in the well being of their employees. Workplace culture was good. They had various parties for different occasions. In my short time there they had a Christmas party and a going away party for one of the store managers who was relocating to the newest store that just opened up in Fort Saskatchewan.

The people and management are nice but the work expectation is extremely high volume, not enough time given to finish tasks because often you are called to somewhere else in the store while trying to complete a task. As well I worked there over 7 months without a single raise, the pay is quite low compared to cost of living meanwhile the prices at the store just keep increasing and increasing ( one of my duties was to put new price stickers up) and after summer was over my hours( as well as most people) were reduced and I was forced to find another part time job, but after a couple months of working 2 jobs I found a full time job making more then I will likely ever make at fresons, however management asked me to stay on part time,  but I only get a shift every 3to5 weeks so I will be giving firm notice after the small Christmas bonus( gift card for 10%  of store purchases) 

I applied to work at the Fort Saskatchewan store after my husband fell severly ill. I was completely honest about my situation and manager hired me to work 3 evenings a week until my husband was stable enough for me to take on more shifts. 
Before I was ready the pressure was on but reducing my hours until I had only 1 3 hour shift every 10 days or so. All this knowing I was the only income in my home since my husband became ill.
I offered to take my preserve at my expense to get shifts in the restaurant when I found out they had nobody to work there. Left messages to my manager with no call backs and I finally went in to see her directly. She told me to make an appointment with her if I wanted to speak with her.
I finally went to see the store manager and told him my story to be told that it is probable best if we move forward from here...meaning your fired.

This is a job that is great for young people, but not for people that have families to support. Freson is a great place to build skills in any dept (and you have to be a strong worker to make it,  or you won't last long, as they under-staff every department to save money)
It's not a job for anyone looking for a life time career, as you will have to threaten to quit to get a raise. But for a year or two,  to gain some skills while getting minimum wage, it can be a very flexible, supportive and enjoyable work environment. Underneath that it's just a depressing undercurrent of people who are fed up with upper management who have unrealistic expectations for how much so little staff can achieve.
The good part is if you do your job well, it's a really relaxed atmosphere.
The bad part is you will always be a number to the head office and what have you done for them lately?

I enjoyed my time here, both coworkers and customers are great, however,  the company is only concerned with making money, not concerned with trying to keep good staff, I worked there almost 9 months without a raise, they said your doing a wonderful job, but just keep trying and maybe next time you will get a raise,  and after summer is over they reduced my hours from full time to maybe 23 hours a week and asked me to begin doing split shifts, or expecting me to be on call for them to just call whenever they happen to need, by October I couldn't manage on the hours I was given so I started looking for other employment.  I did continue to stay on part time through the winter, but was only given a 4 hour shift once a month but again they continued to expect to be able to call me in on short notice.  

Alberta proud! All Alberta meat! Local products, great selection at the highest price! Sarcasm aside, the store was slow a lot of the time, and people only shopped there for sales. Owners were very kind, but very demanding, and cut hours to save money, then wondered why production went down. Any company that views stats to determine efficiency is doomed to never achieve peak level. 

Management was stubborn, and refused to spend extra money to give more hours. Cant keep up during the sales, and they won't pay you to stay late (you can work for free though). Management uses bully tactics.

But hey, at least you get a cool bag of gifts at Christmas!

I learned a couple new feilds and how the every day workings went on.
Management was something to be desired. Didn't follow labour laws and had a bad habit of speaking ill of other employees behind their backs. Also never willing to work with emloyees to solve issues constructively. Like to leave the blame on their employees instead of admitting their own faults.
My co-workers were awesome. Always had fun and worked very well together.
Hardest part of the job was dealing with the management, lack of hours, and the low pay with bad benefits(health care).
The most enjoyable part of this job had to be my coworkers and my customers :-)

Top Job Titles	Average salary
Cashier 64 salaries reported	$16.51 per hour
Baker 56 salaries reported	$20.86 per hour
Butcher 48 salaries reported	$19.10 per hour
Line cook 32 salaries reported	$17.73 per hour
Grocery associate 25 salaries reported	$19.22 per hour

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