photographer

marketing assistant

executive coordinator

customer experience coordinator

assistant marketing

Opus Art Supplies

Opus is a small quirky company that either has very long term staff or a constant rotation of newbies that couldn't handle the training. My location was generally understaffed, although I believe this has now been corrected with new management. The current Kelowna store manager is awesome, although in my time I worked with some management that was less than ideal.The days were either very busy and fast paced, or completely dead and full of "busy work." The computer systems are old, and go pretty down often. Some positions throughout the chain are paid fairly well but in others I found the work expectations to pay were out of whack. 

The hours are steady and consistent, you will likely have set days a week that you work. That's pretty uncommon in retail jobs. There's basic health and dental benefits after 3 months and some other employee bonuses after a year.  As far as general retail goes, the job security is good and the employees are treated pretty well.

There are mandatory daily morning meetings, and monthly meeting after store hours for all staff members. This helps with day to day communication but is sometimes used as a way for middle management to talk at you for a couple hours. Monthly meetings are paid and include free dinner. Sometimes you do arts and crafts for store decorations. 

Opus encourages creativity and exploration of the supplies, you will likely be asked to create store samples of products.

The usual customers are older or retired women, generally they're nice. But beware if Opus has low stock on Liquitex Pouring Medium or whatever other trending Pinterest product, these seemingly sweet old ladies can be meaner than your middle school bullies. Expect to publicly cry at least twice per year. Sometimes they're just mean for no reason at all. 

You'll be trained to work in all areas of the store, cashiering, floor sales staff, and custom framing and digital. Employees rotate through these sections on a day to day basis.

Attracts lots of shoplifters, prepare to lose faith in humanity.

You'll have to clean the (public) bathroom at least once per week, kinda gross. 

Not allowed to talk to co-workers while on shift. Even if the store is dead quiet, go dust some paint tubes or something. The bosses spy on you via security camera phone app. We found the blind spots and chatted anyway.
 
All in all you'll probably work with some cool artists. Not bad for someone who's interested in art supplies and doesn't need a large income.

This job was busy and I worked with great people. The expectations were high compared to the wage. There was not much trust in employees by management. Learning about the products was enjoyable but not enough of the training was paid - expectations were to educate yourself on your own time. Opportunity to experiment with products to put on demonstrations to customers was exciting but yet again, mostly unpaid. Overall disappointing wage and dealing with the manager was miserable, although coworkers and customers almost made it worth it. Raises and benefits promised did not happen. Mandatory staff meetings outside of regular scheduling. Expected to be cross-trained without wage increase.

Management was the smile police. I understand that a smile is important but I was written up for not smiling for my ENTIRE shift it was crazy. The floors are cement and after about 3 hours of constantly pacing I would need to rest, this is not allowed (even leaning). I came from a job with higher pay and honestly wish I hadn’t. They jerked me around with probation and then once it had ended told me I had a secure position before firing me without cause a week later. Management was extremely unprofessional. They pressured me to disclose personal medical information, which they then tried to leverage against me to improve my performance and gave me unsolicited medical advice. I used to be a loyal customer of Opus but after working for them I have avoided the franchise whenever possible.

Great products and lots of fun to explore and sample different artistic modes in order to better help customers. Clients are creative and interesting. There is always something to learn. Unfortunately the pay is very low and while there is supposed to be reviews quarterly with pay raises, they don’t happen on schedule. Some employees were not reviewed for two years. 

Not inclusive despite advertisement.
Not a creative environment.
No training available, self learning only with a pathetically written manual.
Extremely old  and awkward Point of Sale System 
No janitorial services in all stores.
Low growth opportunity.
Inexperienced management. 
Minimal benefits.

Worked at GI, and while the my coworkers were lovely, management wasn't. Our yearly raises never happened, and we were expected to do way more work than we got paid to do. The current manager is temperamental and the reason why most people are leaving now. Customers are allowed to be terrible to employees and no one does a thing about it. Not worth it at all.

Loved my coworkers and the customers. Management could be tricky to navigate sometimes, but overall, a great place to work while in school part-time. Great discount and overall positive customer experience job.

Coworkers and higher up management team are easy to communicate. They are happy to provide any support needed. 

Work environment is genuine and focuses on customer experience.

The people you will work with are amazing, it used to be really fun, and you get free product sometimes. 

However, you will be overworked for as little pay as they can give you and you will have to fight for your raises. Training is informal and pretty bare bones. 

Very good excellent place to work with great staff. we all worked well together and learned skills that I will continue to use in future jobs.
Information and skills were obtained and used on the daily basis.

Top Job Titles	Average salary
Photographer 1 salary reported	$37,960 per year
Marketing assistant 1 salary reported	$37,440 per year
Executive coordinator 1 salary reported	$62,751 per year
Customer experience coordinator 1 salary reported	$22.12 per hour
Assistant marketing 1 salary reported	$38,262 per year

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