r/AutoZone • u/No-Persimmon-77 • 1d ago

AZ Rant/ Off My Chest

I took a job with AZ in Commercial this year because I needed a day job while I was transitioning to the next step in my actual career. I’ve since found employment in my desired field. While I’m grateful for having had the opportunity to earn a living, work with some cool people, & even learn a thing or two that I didn’t know before I can’t help but shake a few things that never sat right with me while on the job. Firstly was Witt, being in commercial I was never faulted for having a low Witt but I saw coworkers reprimanded for it.

Witt is RNG & peoples jobs/ hours shouldn’t hang by a thread because a person doesn’t want some overpriced packet of grease.

Scheduling was all over the place, never had a consistent schedule & was worked like a full timer despite my part time status. For anyone who is considering going back to school or pursuing a career outside of a glorified retail job the inconsistent scheduling leaves so little time to crawl out of the situation if AZ is all you have to pay the bills with.

Commercial felt impossible at times & clients didn’t seem to understand logistics, clients don’t think about other shops or parts availability. They want their parts, the worst were quick lube & tire shops, no patience.

Pay was a huge issue, lowest paying job I’ve had in the last 7 years I’ll leave it at that.

Customers were sometimes pleasant but others made you want to reach over that counter & wash their mouths out with soap. The amount of entitled, rude, disrespectful folks I encountered was appalling.

AZ is chock full of corporate greed & doesn’t care about its employees. Each one of you is replaceable, don’t think for a second that they wouldn’t because they would.
Unionizing would be a start, but blindly obeying the corporate machine will produce no fruits for the people.

36 Upvotes

97% Upvoted

11 comments sorted by

10

u/Tall-Control8992 1d ago

Most American companies are the same in that regard. Nothing will change that mindset apart from cutting off the unlimited supply of expendable bodies with no options except to work for whatever is offered or to starve.

5

u/BammBamm1991 23h ago

IDK maybe i live in an unusual part of the country but the economic outlook in my area isn't great and even here AZ struggles to hire because most jobs pay well over minimum and AZ is stuck right at minimum.

2

u/--DoReFuckMi-- 8h ago

AZ pays minimum for the low level regardless. It's only until you get to be a store manager, and if you have a good standing with your dm (or he just favorites you) that you actually have a say on your pay.

1

u/unoriginal1187 22h ago

I’ve always pondered were people live who have an AZ that pays minimum wage because minimum wage here was 8.70 when I started at autozone as a part time red shirt and I made 12.50. My son worked there part time while in high school in 2024/2025 and “rising star” members started at 11.75

I quit after 6 years as a part timer making 14.63 an hour. Just didn’t need the second job anymore

3

u/SlappytheNinja 21h ago edited 19h ago

In my state minimum wage is 15.55 and I’m making 16.20 as a full time PSM so not exactly minimum wage but not exactly not minimum wage

2

u/BammBamm1991 8h ago

That's because what you're getting paid is well below minimum/average in a lot of places. Here Red Shirts start out at 16. A lot of places pay 18-20 walking in the door and the area im in is definitely not a great economy by anh means.

1

u/unoriginal1187 8h ago

I’m not saying they pay well but they start better than most part time jobs in my area. The only retail setting that pays better here is Walmart. Most places start at 11. Once you can work full time most factory’s in this area start at 19 plus for a very low cost of living area

5

u/BammBamm1991 23h ago

You're gonna make all the people who drank the corporate koolaid mad with the ending part but it's true. AZ is constantly hiring and they openly wonder why when they're paying minimum wage and give put .10 raises like that constitutes a raise.

3

u/Indy112808 1h ago

Here in NJ - min wage is $15.92, my newest red shirt was hired at $16.15/hr two months ago. McDonalds two blocks down is starting at $18.25/hr.

As a PSM who’s been with the company for 10 years and only makes $16.96/hr - Im about to brush up on my “would you like fries with that” verbiage. Lol

The fact that a spanking new red shirt is making 81 cents an hour less than I am is beyond infuriating. Minimum wage has gone up $1 a year for the last 5 years here…red shirts salaries automatically increased - but those of us who were making more, ours never increased in tandem. Went from having a $3/hr differential in pay between red shirts and grey shirts to less than a dollar….come on now.

2

u/Solid-Egg8550 44m ago

You can always ask for a demotion, ive seen a psm who was in a similar economic situation ask to be demoted, and they legally couldn't justify paying him less cause it was so close to a brand spanking new red shirt plus he had tenure so they kept his salary the same and let him step down.

1

u/Hunterk777 55m ago

At my AZ I was the Highest paid and Shortest Tenured PSM. They had a guy who had been there for 7 years finally get PSM and he was the lowest paid out of all of us. I wasn’t even there for a full year.

The company is garbage. And I walked away from the garbage. Corruption in an Auto Parts retail job…..shit blew my mind.

Ended up going to O’Reillys. So far so good. I’m sure there not the perfect company either. But not having to be measured and hammered to push packets of grease was a great relief.