Tired of hearing about big box stores

Rob you are selling for something better. A change is better, vacations are better, not running your own biz is better. I'm not trying to bust your boys. I am just saying people have reasons to move on. You do and he does. oh yeah I forgot I'm not trying to burn anyone just giving my opinion.

Here is another opinion, when you have to argue with a employee on a daily basis, is it an employee issue or a owner issue. This is simple, it is not a discussion, you do what your employer tells you. When you shift blame to others or are "sick" 5 days a month, this is not a employer issue at all. Some people look for easy street, my store is not about easy street. It is about doing the job properly the first time with a level of integrity far above the other shops.

In an act of sheer desperation they made an offer to this kid. How many installers do you people employ that do not own their own tools? FS is buying him tools to get him there as well, if he stays for a year (which I now know they do not expect him to), the tools are "his to keep" (right, after working for a big box, get it in writing). Now, not knowing how the benefits package work there, they also told him that he could have his girlfriends teeth fixed at no charge and in specific they would pay for the braces. Braces are cosmetic work, I don't know of one company in the industry that covers cosmetic work. What else, oh, we'll call you a manager (of a 1 person bay). So let's see how green the grass is on the other side or how gullible this person truly is, time will tell. At the end of the day this can be looked at two ways. As an employer if the work outweighs the BS, you pay him and keep him employed. For him if the new work outweighs the BS, it is a good deal for him. Personally, as a past employee of a big box, I know that the BS outweighs the work done. This is why most of the old dogs in the industry own their own shops.

Well Im going to stay away from Rob and Speedway's discussion in this one and just respond to the author about the big box stores and why we rag on them.

Yes there are plenty of great installers at BB, CC, and FS, Im sure there are hundreds of them, but that is out of thousands of employees.  I worked at BB for a while last year, would have preferred my local custom shop, but they werent hiring and honestly couldnt afford to take a risk on me.  BB offered me good pay (for a 17 year old kid it was honestly just great), an opportunity to do what I love, and a great way to get into the business.  Now I was a salesman in the car-fi department, not an installer, but the installers back the whole car-fi department got to be like one big family.  Our two main installers had gotten in the business at Best Buy and were still working there 7 years later.  These guys have no custom work on their application, but I cant think of a thing on my car I wouldnt feel comfortable with them doing if I needed a hand.  Thats because with these two it was about the hobby for them years back, just like it is for me right now, they took the time to learn how to do things right, even if the company didnt spoon feed it to them.  There are guys like this all over the place, just because you work for a company doesnt mean that the quality of your work is on par with the quality of the company.

However, we crack jokes at the big boxes' expense because not everybody is like this.  If you go to a custom shop and have work done, MOST of the time (and I stress the most), you know that if you wanted to go quiz the installers on some pretty advanced stuff, they will know it.  Best Buy, and to my knowledge all of the big boxes, do not really train people.  Ive seen what training is like there, and it basically consists of watch this video, now watch this installer, now get out there and bust out some overhead screen installs and remote starts.  They dont take the time to really have them look over another installers back for a week or two and see how things should be done.  At BB within a week of working as an installer, even if you have no experience, you can expect to be out in that bay by yourself, with nobody to ask questions to if you get a little bit lost.  They also dont take time to really pick out good installers, Rob was right about how they get desperate and take anybody.  There are only so many enthusiasts in this business, I know for a store like BB Im a steal, I require no training, and really have full product and installation knowledge (within what best buy does, Im not saying I know everything).  Custom shops only look for these guys, because they cant afford to have a bad reputation for bad installs, and take pride in what they do.  Big boxes are left just taking anybody that they feel will be able to grasp the concept of splicing a harness onto the back of a deck and popping it into the car.  I know at my girlfriend's store they were taking a random guy from LP (Loss Prevention) and he was about to start in the install bay, this guy had no prior experience in car audio, no idea what he was doing at all, but the install bay pays better than most other positions at these stores so he wanted the job.  I had a hard time getting into a custom shop where I live, after reading this forum daily, and installing things on the side for the past 4 years, where this guy just goes in and gets a full time install job at a big box, I cant begin to imagine a custom shop that would hire a guy like this, just because they pay well.

So in short, sure there are some great installers at the big boxes, the pay, benefits, and job security are very enticing to some amazing installers.  But in general the big boxes dont really take the time or steps necessary to really make sure that the work pushed out of their bays is top notch like smaller shops do.  Hope this clarifies.