It's a fast paced but organised company,,they recognise when your working hard and thank you,if your not doing your job well,they retrain you or give you another job to try, it's a good company to work for

Pros

A contract after few months

Cons

More incentives

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Friendly co workers

Production Operator (Current Employee) - Washington - 26 June 2022

Company tries many different schemes to boost morale but fails to realise a decent pay would work wonders and stop staff from leaving for better local companies, though recently it doesn't seem to care about losing staff. Also targets at times can be unreachable as it is heavy work.

Pros

Permanent dayshift, 4 day week

Cons

Low wage, no real chance of career advancement

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Insights into Hillarys Blinds

Based on 18 survey responses

Areas for improvement

Support from manager
Inclusive work environment
General feeling of work happiness

Toxic culture

Production Associate (Former Employee) - Washington - 23 June 2022

Not the best culture to be working in, some lovely people to work with some not so nice people to work with.Unrealistic KPI’s with little to no help from management

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Not a good place to work

Advisot (Former Employee) - Inverness - 13 June 2022

Pay not goodNo help Just really really bad They don't support you and you are left by yourself to work stuff out They don't help you out They want all the money you get selling blinds you get a very small amount.

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Pressure to attain high targets

Sales Advisor (Former Employee) - Bexhill - 11 April 2022

At times chaotic production problems. Customers left waiting for products. Middle management pressure for higher figures while HO offer large discounts on products.

Pros

Work alone. Always paid on time

Cons

Too many middle managers

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Stressful, average salary for very long hours, forced to work weekends to complete office tasks, disgruntled workforce

Senior Management (Former Employee) - South of England - 27 March 2022

Highly pressurised management position, constantly undermined Average industry salary for working in excess of 70-80 hours incl weekends on pcLack of support by senior management, opinions not valued & workload impossible Fellow management too scared to say how they really feelHorrible 'clique' culture exists, if you're doing well they'll talk to you if your face fits

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Very stressful

Customer Service Agent (Former Employee) - Nottingham, Nottinghamshire - 12 January 2022

Fitters constantly missing fitting appointments and irate customers who have taken their old curtains down and a day off work. Management don't care.

Pros

Free fruit

Cons

angry customers

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Could be a good place to work in if they paid a decent salary for the work you have to carry out.

Advisor and fitter (Current Employee) - Sell and fit blinds. - 3 December 2021

Hillarys make a lot of false promises. I have been working with them for 5 months and although I have reached my target most of the time I have never been paid one penny more than tha basic 17.5% which is not enough to give you a fair wage for the hours you put in.

Pros

No free lunches and no time to have lunch most days.

Cons

The days can be long and stressful.

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Difficult to switch off at night when finished working as phone constantly ringing.

Estimator / Fitter (Former Employee) - Home - 13 November 2021

There was no end to the day as phone ringing all the time. I had very poor postcode areas which meant a lot of travelling. Also asked to go out of my postcode areas more than once which was high mileage and time consuming and dragged me away from my booked jobs.

Pros

None

Cons

Long hours

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Lifestyle job

Design Consultant (Current Employee) - South West - 28 October 2021

I am a Design Consultant with Hillary’s and have been in the role for 2.5 years. The hours can be long, but I run my own diary, so it’s my choice if I work several 11 hour days in order to work 5 hours on a Friday!! The products are excellent, the company has a well regarded name in the industry and I enjoy meeting people and discussing their needs. The rewards for being successful are excellent. There are negatives. You need to be able to motivate yourself and be confident in working alone as there is very little support from management. Communication in all areas of the business needs improving significantly to improve the customer experience. Overall this is one of the best jobs I’ve ever had. I’m my own boss and enjoy every day.

Pros

Interesting and varied

Cons

Communication

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Don't work for them

Specialist installer (Former Employee) - South East - 28 October 2021

It's not a job. You pay them £2000 to work for them. They give poor training. Drive you mad. Only pay 8%. When they have a sale you have to swallow the discount. This is not a job. It is a franchise. No employment benefits. 60 hours a week, and you might make an ok living. They fine you for mistakes. Even if the sales person has written down a wrong colour. You will pay.I have been in this business for 30 years. They are awful stay away

Pros

None

Cons

Everything

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Very stressful, underpaid basic salary with little or no chance of achieving bonus targets. Poor support from senior management

Field Installation Manager (Former Employee) - Portsmouth, but Nottingham is main hub - 20 September 2021

Very target driven, basic salary too low for the amount of responsibility. Quarterly bonuses unachievable, 50% at best. Lack of support/ongoing training. Very time consuming work hours, not covered by salary. Puts a massive strain on your home life. Field operatives (sales or 'design consultants') regularly mis-sale at inflated prices becaus they are commission based, earning 10% of the overall cost of each order. Installers/surveyors also earn 10% but have to correct what has been mis-sold. Customers are therefore not all treated the same as they are charged diffeing amounts depending in skill, ability of sales advisor to extract as much as they can. Very clique work culture.

Pros

Company car, although BIK tax can cost around £200 a month

Cons

Long hours, unsympathetic management, unachievable bonus scheme, regulsr unsociable remote working with little or no support

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I wouldnt recommend.

Production Operative (Former Employee) - Washington - 8 May 2021

I worked in the metal venetian dep't at Hillarys. The hours were fine but they were long days!The job itself is boring once you know what you're doing and they expect a lot of work out of you for the money you get! Also if they find you hate a certain task they will take you for a conplete mug and put you on that task at any given time. It got to the point where I kicked off with them.There is a lot of favouritism and a lot of family and friends there which doesn't help on the favouritism part. There is no room for progression unless you're a friend, family or favourite. There is overtime almost all the time but there is no work life balance at all. Basically Blinds are life. In the end I never ever did overtime because I couldn't bare to be there any longer than I had to be there.On the whole leaving there is probably one of the best things I've ever done.

Cons

Long days, Management are a joke, pay, repetitive, boring, no progression.

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Productive

Production Operative (Current Employee) - Washington - 28 February 2021

Heavy work, good benefits for staff on permanent contract but nothing for temps, disheartening when temp contracts get extended but with no promise of permanent just maybes so no security or benefits

Pros

Decent breaks

Cons

Heavy work

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Low bar to entry

Specialist products fitter (Former Employee) - South West - 7 January 2021

I spent 18 months working as a SP fitter. I took the job between careers while I was worked out what I wanted to do with my life. Its a very low bar to entry meaning anyone of any ability can rock up with their £2k and be trained as a specialist fitter. The implications of this is that your working area can have many fitters and the limited jobs are shared amongst you all. The area I covered seemed to have loads of fitters which meant that there were lots of days with no work at all or 1 or 2 jobs a day. This is no where near enough to make a living wage. Especially as you take the cost of running the business, vehicle, fuel, tools etc.You are also very much at the mercy of Hillary's aggressive and many money-off sales. Your commission is based on the sale price and some of the BOGOF offers Hillary's double your work for a given cost/commission. It really is a race to the bottom as H has to compete against its competition.Other fitters in different areas will have financial success stories but you need to know that you never know how saturated your area is with fitters. I enjoyed the work but there just wasn't enough of it available to make a living. I barely covered running costs. This would be a good 2nd income if you do shift work eg fireman but if you want to feed your family then it's a big gamble.

Pros

Easy to start up

Cons

Not enough work

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Not what was promised

Hoist Operator (Former Employee) - Washington, Tyne and Wear - 30 September 2020

When you start working here they will promise you anything, but sharply take it away.Cell leaders don't lead by example. No progression. Favoritism

Pros

You might get some free fruit on a friday

Cons

Workers get punished, slackers get praised

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If your looking to develop, you are in the wrong place

Office staff (Current Employee) - Nottingham - 13 August 2020

Whilst the benefits and flexibility is good, the management is poor and the development of even day to day activity. You could have great ideas and look at implementing change but they will not be ready for you. The atmosphere is too relaxed

Pros

free fruit and month awareness for different causes

Cons

lacking structure

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Very long hours

Sales Assistant (Former Employee) - Livingston - 10 July 2020

Sitting at the same stall all day. It’s not a hard job just very very long hours and customers can be so harsh and judgmental. I personally didn’t have enough hours but I was on a contract that fit at the time.

Pros

Good pay

Cons

Long Days

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Brilliant people, great opportunities

Digital Designer (Former Employee) - Colwick, Nottinghamshire - 22 June 2020

Worked as a digital designer in the marketing department for 5 years and had a fantastic experience. I went from being quite a reserved, cautious employee to taking on larger projects and developing personal & technical skills. The design team is fantastic and has consistently pushed to improve over the years. If you're looking to find somewhere to advance your skills in design, development or marketing I would thoroughly recommend it to anyone who wants to take a step forwards in their career.

Pros

Events, Training, Team Work

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Something of a mixed bag.

Advisor Business Systems Support (Former Employee) - Colwick, Nottinghamshire - 10 June 2020

I started as an apprentice in the IT department in 2016. My job role involved providing IT support to the sales advisor network, while they were selling and fitting out in the field. Initially, I found Hillary's to be a decent place to work, but after I passed my apprenticeship and got taken on full time my opinion began to change. My job role was very repetitive and tedious, and did not feel like a real IT job. The team environment was quite relaxed, and there weren't any negative consequences for having 35 minutes lunch instead of 30, for example. There were a couple of occasions where more senior staff tried to convince me that almost all other workplaces were much more strict, though this has not been my experience. Due to the bespoke nature of all the systems I had to use, none of the skills I acquired while at Hillary's have been transferable to other IT jobs. Also, I spent as much time arguing with the people I was supposed to be supporting as I did fixing there problems. I found this to be very frustrating. Looking back on it now, I believe that the job role I was in would be suitable for a person of average ability who had no interest or desire to progress an IT career, but totally unsuitable for someone with genuine technical ability who wishes to advance and better themselves. I never felt that there was any possibility of progression. I don't have any strong views about the senior management team, but my own line manager was quite good, and I think recognized my frustrations about lack of progression and the tedious nature of my job role. A group -

Pros

Everyone I worked with was really nice, Both Line managers I had were good, the hours were reasonable and the work environment was relaxed.

Cons

Boring job role supporting horrible people, lack of progression opportunities, not a real IT job.

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A good place to work.

Grassroots Organizer (Former Employee) - Los Angeles, CA - 23 April 2020

A good place to work. The management team was very well organized and our goals were very clear. I worked with a supportive team of people who were as passionate about the work as I was.

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