sales associate

assistant buyer

beauty advisor

sales manager

manager

Holt Renfrew

A typical day at work:
1. Starving for a Break. The management's poor scheduling practices made it nearly impossible to enjoy a much-needed break during the workday. It seemed as if they prioritized cutting costs over the welfare of their staff. Consequently, we were left to endure long stretches without any respite, leaving us physically and mentally drained. It was as though the company cared little for our basic needs, forcing us to choose between nourishment and adhering to the unrelenting demands of the job.
2. Exploited and under-appreciated. The burden of being overworked and underpaid weighed heavily on all of us. Not only were we expected to fulfill the responsibilities of our designated roles, but we were also coerced into taking on additional tasks that were well beyond our job descriptions. This blatant exploitation of our dedication and skills left us feeling undervalued and taken advantage of.
Furthermore, staying overtime became a norm, but the company's refusal to compensate us for the extra hours spent was simply unacceptable. Our hard work and commitment went unnoticed, and instead, we were left struggling to make ends meet, without any recognition of our sacrifices. The distressing reality of my typical workday was a constant reminder of how little the company regarded its employees as anything more than expendable resources. The absence of empathy and genuine concern for our welfare painted a bleak picture of a workplace that prioritized profits at the expense of our physical and emotional health.

Management & Workplace Culture:
The lack of adequate training was astonishing. New employees were expected to navigate the complex systems and processes on their own, with little to no guidance. Moreover, the management's disinterest in fostering employee growth was evident. Instead of providing opportunities for skill development or advancement, they seemed content with keeping us confined to our roles without any chance of progress. Any attempt to express interest in personal or professional growth was met with indifference or, even worse, discouragement. But the most appalling aspect of Holt Renfrew's management was the toxic bullying culture that they allowed to thrive within the company. The harassment and mistreatment were shockingly pervasive, with managers often engaging in abusive behavior towards their subordinates. I personally witnessed coworkers reduced to tears due to relentless and unwarranted berating by those in positions of authority.

My time at Holt Renfrew was an eye-opening experience that shattered my preconceived notions about human resources in the corporate world. Rather than being an advocate for employees' rights, HR seemed more concerned with shielding the company from liability, even if it meant downplaying or dismissing employees' distressing experiences. Throughout my tenure at Holt Renfrew, I faced a toxic work environment where bullying and victimization were distressingly common, perpetuated by both my manager and coordinator. Despite raising these concerns with HR, their response was far from the support I expected. It became evident that HR's primary goal was to minimize the impact of such incidents on the company's reputation, rather than addressing the harmful behaviour and protecting the well-being of employees. To my dismay, HR was well aware of the toxic dynamics within the workplace, yet chose to turn a blind eye and let the situation fester. My complaints and reports seemed to vanish into thin air, and the management responsible for the inappropriate behavior faced no consequences. Instead, I found myself on the receiving end of reprimands and retaliation for daring to speak up against such mistreatment.

Working at Holt Renfrew taught me a harsh lesson about the stark reality of corporate HR, leaving me disillusioned and disheartened. It's disconcerting to realize that the department that should serve as a safety net for employees is, in fact, an extension of the company's efforts to protect its image, even at the cost of their workforce's mental well-being.

Beware the captivating facade presented by this company's purported values of "warmth and unity," for they are nothing but a delusional smokescreen masking the harsh reality within. On the surface, these words might evoke an image of a caring and harmonious work environment, where employees are treated with kindness and respect. However, the truth couldn't be farther from this illusion. Behind the veil of "warmth," I discovered a disheartening lack of genuine compassion. The company's professed concern for its employees seemed nothing more than a hollow marketing gimmick. Beneath the veneer of smiles, I experienced a workplace culture that prioritized profit margins over the well-being of its workforce. Similarly, the notion of "unity" within the company proved to be nothing but a mirage. Instead of fostering a collaborative and supportive atmosphere, I encountered divisions and internal strife.It became apparent that the proclaimed values of "warmth and unity" were merely buzzwords, used to lull potential employees into a false sense of security. In reality, this company's true priorities were far from the nurturing and cohesive environment they purported to offer.


If you value a supportive and empathetic work environment, I caution you against considering Holt Renfrew as an employer. The lack of genuine concern for employees' welfare and the disturbing pattern of silencing those who report toxic behavior are indicative of a company culture that prioritizes self-preservation over the welfare of its team members. The discrepancy between their advertised ideals and the stark reality of their practices reveals a company willing to deceive rather than uphold the principles they claim to hold dear. Do not be swayed by their clever marketing; instead, seek an employer that truly walks the talk and values its employees beyond mere empty words.

I worked in the Visual Presentation department for a little over a year and looking back I'm surprised I stuck around that long! I began as an intern and was hired full-time after two months. What interested me was the money I was getting for someone who was still in the learning process of Visual Merchandising, the hours being 9-5 Mon-Fri, Job stability and my Manager who was really warm and sweet. 

It didn't take long for all of that to change. Six weeks into my role my Manager who took me under her wing quit to go to another company. My second mentor left to go to another department. And for the next two months we were left with NO MANAGEMENT!! WHich means I wasn't learning anything! And I left school because I was promised on the job training! For the next two months I was left all alone with rest of the Visual team who had NO love for me at ALL. I had been warned by my mentors that if you were a hetro and/or not female you would not be welcomed.

The main Visual Stylist was a quiet homosexual man who did not communicate very well with anyone because he just wanted to do his own thing and didn't care about being a mentor, even if we was striving to become a Manager someday. The female Visual Merchandiser was incredibly two-faced who tried to get her Manager (my first Mentor) fired because she hired a Hetro-sexual Stylist (my second mentor) whose personality didn't "fit-in". Another Homosexual male stylist who joined the team later and seemed friendly at first quickly turned and became a huge diva whose ego was bigger then his actual talent! Another female stylist, who also was hired after me, had so much emotional baggage and would display her stress and emotional fits freely in front of the team! She was truly emotionally unstable! The four divas certainly meshed well together and were joined at the hip. 

FInally a new Manager (Male and Homosexual) came along who had a reputation for being a no-nonsense, professional sort who I could learn a lot from and would clean up the problems in our department! That reputation quickly faded. At first, we would communicate with each other and I would fill him in on the attitudes and problems that was going on in the department. He said he knew and was eager to clean up. He fired one of the Divas whose ego was bigger than his talent. Things looked good at the beginning, but that didn't last long! HE began to develop a DIva quality himself. He delegated from his desk chair. He would mock me because I didn't know how to do something (I was suppose to have been trained by them, remember. That was the point I took the job.) ANd he would have Interns learn some skills that I was suppose to be learning. All he had me do was paint the windows. He would sell-out the people that believed in him when he first came out by pointing their mistakes and flaws behind their backs to the GM. He picked his favourites. And although the Main Diva HATED the Manager the Manager would gleefully suck up to him while bad mouthing him behind his back. There was SO MUCH TENSION between the Diva and the Manager that I thought the Diva's head would have an atomic explosion. The Main Diva wanted the Manager's position, that's why. Finally, when the Manager yelled at me on the floor in front of customers blaming me because his favourite stylist (a female) had left without communicating with me and left the work unfinished I had had enough. It only solidified my decision the next morning when I walked in and the Manager was being all sweet to his favourite stylist and complimenting her shoes, instead of straightening her out for leaving without finishing or cleaning up. When I gave him my two weeks notice he just laughed and asked for a particular intern's phone number whom he had wanted to hire. He became the worst Diva of them ALL!

I thought it was going to be a place of incredible professionalism and talent. A great learning experience! but it was a waste of over a year where I was surrounded by fashion divas and over-swelled egos! I would NOT wish this on anyone!!

I was a personal shopping assistant at Holt Renfrew.  I have to say I was very excited to be working for this company but now that I have worked there I do not see it in the same way.

Compared to other companies the one nice thing about my position was that I made $15.00 an hour.  However, after working there and realizing how much work is involved and how under appreciated you are as well as how badly you are treated this is not enough compensation.  Seeing a shopper (who may have made their assistant pull the clothes and just shown up for the appointment) make 10% commission on a sale anywhere from $5,000 - $25,000 in an appointment anywhere from 20 minutes to an hour and a half was very disheartening.  No, you do not get any commission.  Working for someone who does half if not a quarter of the work and then seeing them make $2,500 while you make $15.00, sucks.

We would rarely get our lunch breaks.  We were entitled to an hour a day but would be so busy that we wouldn't get the time to take it.  To make up for this we would mark down that we had no lunches BUT would get lectured by our managers that we need to take our lunches.  They would never speak to the actual personal shoppers and say "make sure your assistant is taking a lunch break."  They made it our duty to say something, which for some people is uncomfortable when it can be busy.

All management cared about were sales.  If you were making the company money they would treat you like gods, however, if you were in my position they were not friendly.  They were constantly on our backs about every little thing.  Holding meetings every so often with the personal shopper to let you know what you are doing WRONG and not showing appreciation for what you are doing RIGHT.  The DVP would walk around and if you tried having a conversation with her all she would want to talk about were appointments and sales etc.  She was not a friendly person and I honestly got the impression a lot of the staff were afraid of her.  However, the VP was very friendly and you could always talk to him as an equal.

Overall, while this company has beautiful clothing and items it was awful to work for.  Thank god I had a close relationship with the other assistants or else I would have hated going to work every day.  I have never worked so hard in my life and felt so unappreciated.  If I had been compensated higher I may not have minded so much.  But being someone's unappreciated employee for $15.00 an hour was not worth it in my opinion.

At first it is nice to work for Holt Renfrew. The building and the people (customers and co-workers) are generally nice and welcoming. This will last as long as you do youre job good and adequate without any shortcomings, but once I had an accident and was not willing/ able to work for more then 12 hours daily, things changed quickly. After my initial talk to my manager to get more time off and I wanted to cut down to at least 35 to 45 hours a week, I got told to go early home and everything would be fine. After that my schedule got just more hours. My decission to turn my promotion down and to leave the company for my own health got looked down at...I got insulted by the manager and got told over the phone, that I will never ever have any future in the company from the day on.

I am glad I left and the amount of stress, responibility and committment employees at holts have to give without any appriciation results in frustrated workers and is a direct reflection of a poor management. Schedules are changed without notice, I seen (including me) to often employees run out the store crying and whenever changes or a rush happens, the manager vaporizes and wont be found till later. At Holts, the employee who cares the most about doing a perfect job will be the first who gets thrown under the bus.

I am not weak and had bad jobs before in my life, but you need to be strong to survive this negative work environment and the daily critics of your work - regardless of your performance!

I even had nightmares for days after I left, I wont even go close to the department store and walk an extra 10 minutes every day to walk in a bow arround it.

Cons: You’ll meet some great individuals and questionable ones, some who are part of management. Sometimes they disappear on you when you’re in need for support or an urgent response. FYI, the training is below the bar/ bare minimum. There’s not much growth to the company unless you plan on staying long term to be overworked and underpaid. The company is quite outdated which is mainly held back by the people in head office from reaching its potential. Expect high demands and low returns from seniors and head office. The company is fixated on focusing on their own employees well beings yet can’t pay their management a reasonable salary and associates (FOH/BOH) are paid close to or at minimum wage. Instead they suggest you to do healthy activities OUTSIDE of work and maybe have a few fun meetings/group activities here and there. Their IT system is also extremely outdated. They talk the talk but don’t walk the walk when it comes to improvements.

Pros: You will meet some great people if you’re a genuinely a great person. There are nice associates and and also some people in management who do care about you. The workload isn’t stressful unless you’re handling with tough clients or deadlines, otherwise a good temporary filler job option. The company is putting in a lot of effort to become more sustainable which is nice if you care about that. The number one pro is the discount and maybe the benefits, mostly because the benefits between FT and PT employee are not different - great for part-timers. There’s a lot more incentives and bonuses in sales too if you’re looking into becoming a sales associate. 

Overall, it’s like anything you would expect from any other retailer. 

When I started at Holt Renfrew I was super excited. Initially training was thorough and my job was well explained and I felt confident in my position. The team is so welcoming and are very passionate about what they do which makes it enjoyable to work there. Slowly I was given more and more responsibility that was above my position. I barely had time to keep up with my basic "make it through the day" tasks, so all important administrative and preparation tasks fell behind. On top of struggling to keep up, our hours were cut and management micromanaged when overtime was needed. I spoke with management multiple times about my concerns but they were ignored. 
I was left with the decision to continue constantly fighting with management about how I needed support, time, and to be paid equitably; or to simply walk away. 
I was completely burnt out. This was the most stressful job I've ever had and it was only an entry level position. 
If you're starting out in luxury retail, take this position because it's the best learning experience, everything afterwards will be a piece of cake. You'll learn from some of the top people in the country about fashion, but if you're not good at leaving work at work, this is not a position for you. If you've ever wanted to experience the spiral Andy has in "the Devil wears Prada" this is the job for you!
 
Honestly as a whole, Holt Renfrew is a great company and I am glad for the experience, I just wish that they are able to actively support their employees in the future. 

On average I receive 200+ emails per day on top of my 4+ hours of meetings. In-between that I need to find time to complete my actual job (which usually falls into the evening hours, however there is no overtime pay). 4 people on my team have gone on stress leave within the last year; considering this is a fairly small team I believe this to be a staggering amount of people. There is a high turnover rate in every department and when people leave the company might not fill the position, leaving the remaining team to absorb the workload. Many people leave due to the unspoken expectations to work long hours to show commitment. There is no fairness in salary across the company and compensation is extremely top heavy, with management making significantly more than individual contributors. Bonuses are quite low and completely dependent on the total company making its goals. YoY increases are less than half of inflation so you lose money working here each year. The corporate office claims to have a hybrid work model, however they have been consistently adding more mandatory days in the office each year (I predict by 2026 everyone will be back in office full time). In addition, HR purposely only collects employee feedback from certain people in order to paint a better picture of the employee experience. In conclusion, if you have nothing else important in your life and you never want to buy property this is the perfect place to work. 

I enjoyed my job very much, and it was the Best Job I ever had in my life. Great Team work, and wonderful employees as well. The assistant manager didn't like me, and always seemed to give me a hard time, and always seemed to be on my back. He would roll his eyes at me all the time, to try and intimidate me. He made fun of me as well, as I'm a True Christian. I worked there 5 years as Seasonal worker and he knew I wanted F/T and they hired 4 people on F/T who started way after I did, when he knew I wanted F/T. It took 5 years to get on F/T. I had to  quit 2 years later because of him. I went on vacation in May and didn't come back, as I wasn't ever going back there again. He called a meeting of all the employees when I never came back to let all of them know I was fired. I wasn't fired. I sent a letter to the manager and let him know I wasn't coming back. My mistake was, that I should've gone to Human Resources as well as the Manager to let them know about this. I will never live this down. I also worked at the Bloor Street store for 3 months to help out in their busy season in cosmetics stock room and shipping and receiving, and it was Absolutely Wonderful working there. I knew the Manager of Shipping/Receiving from Etobicoke. It was a wonderful environment and atmosphere. I've tried to go back there since they downsized. I was called 3x to come in, for a Group Interview, but I can't do that.

On a typical day at work: one would sign in and head onto the sales floor. There, one would greet and welcome every customer to come into the store. 
Selling purely based in commission, it's more important to focus on your customer service. Once giving the customer the very best service is at the heart of your approach, sales will naturally follow. 

Management has always left something to be desired, in this company. I can't discuss details, but suffice it to say that where they put their money, hours and ideas are not exactly conducive to a thriving work place. But I still do my job to the best of my abilities and follow company policy.
The hardest part of the job is just this:not being able to leave work at work. I'd have a constant life-line to all of my clients. Not that it's anything I can't handle, but I feel that the more difficult part is constantly answering to clients every hour of the day, inclusive of my days off. Also, going into the store on my days off, to service clients personally- so that I'm sure they're receiving the very best in service.

The most enjoyable part of the job can't be brought down to just one point. The team I'd work with was amazing, and working with the clients I had was always a joy as well. I've learned a lot of positive things through coworkers, and I've vastly improved in mandarin as a direct result of constantly working with Chinese clientele.

Working here I had a manipulative experience with members of my team and management. Initially they try very hard to boost your morale to make you feel like a part of the workplace, however that does not last. It then becomes very clear that unwarranted personal opinions have more weight than work ethic does. Therefore, trying to fit in or even get a chance at advancing solely relies on pandering to particular people, regardless of your skills. Issues like micro-management of tasks, trying to use newer staff as scapegoats for mistakes or difficult tasks, and the culture of defaulting to gossip behind people’s backs made it feel not worth working here for the meagre pay. Also, management is not professional, they will display blatant favouritism. Some staff members that are argumentative and disruptive to other workers and even customers will be praised regardless of what they do. It is unfortunate that these aspects can overshadow one’s experience and have more influence on one’s ability to advance in the company. I strongly believe that this company needs to examine certain staff more thoroughly to understand why they have high turnover rate. 

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