Worst Work Environment - Anonymous employee Cuker Employee Review

1.0
26 Jan 2015
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Work life balance and location of the office

Cons

Adel (the co-founder) is the cheapest man alive and treats people horribly. He highly underpays everyone there, makes promises he never keeps and has unrealistic expectations by underbidding business and expecting people to adhere to the tiny budgets. Aaron is a narcissist and horrible to work with as well. From the outside looking in, it looks like a cool and fun place to work. Only 5 days of PTO are given a year and most people end up just taking unpaid vacation which they are happy to do so they can reduce their payroll. The company always has money problems and can barely pay their bills or vendors. My advice on working there- DONT DO IT....EVER!

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Cuker Response
11y
I was deeply saddened when I read this post because this is not who we are and what we do. We have a great team, a fun environment, and we’ve worked so hard together as a group to build our agency. We treat our team like family and I personally put my heart and passion into helping train, teach, guide, inspire, and empower our team to do the best work of their careers. I tell everyone when they join, not every day will be easy, but I am going to push them to be the best they can be. Many of our team members have been with us for over 5 years and have seen significant career growth, awards, and had the opportunity to work with top brands on websites and digital marketing campaigns. I am humble and grateful to get to work side by side with our awesome team every day. So when I saw this post, it saddens me that someone is motivated to harm us. The post is not sharing the truth. I wish to share the truth and protect the strong reputation that our team has worked so hard to create. Our PTO policy was misrepresented. In fact, we even reward our long term team members with 3 weeks vacation. Our financial position was misrepresented. We are in our 9th year and we have grown every single year since our start. Even during the recession we sustained steady year over year growth. We are independent and have been completely self financed for 9 years. We don’t have vendors. We don’t outsource. We do all of our work in-house so the comment with regards to not paying vendors is not accurate. The tiny budget comment is false. We turn away potential new clients on a weekly basis because they don’t have enough budget for our team to have the time to work the account effectively. Something we pride ourselves in, is taking on work that allows us to perform at our gold standard level. The claims regarding our bidding process is false. I don’t know who this anonymous person is but they say they worked with us less than a year. No one in our organization deals with our business information except for our long term senior leadership and our accounting department, not someone that just started with our agency. Anyone who’s worked with me knows the following: 1) I place a very high value on good design. 2) I’m the hardest worker you’ll meet. I have worked day, night, and weekend for 9 years, and I’ll do anything I can to help support our team. 3) If anyone were to ask me in casual conversion how “I” built the agency, I would politely correct them that it wasn’t “me”, it was our team, and together we built the agency. 4) I do a lot to give back actively participating in Charity events, donating iPads to the Autism Center, the CAF Triathlon(we sponsored 2 teams from our agency this year), and an annual Scholarship with the San Pasqual Academy High School to name a few. This was my first time being called a narcissist. It didn’t feel very good. I’ll let you make your judgment on that one based on my response here. When we started the Agency we set out to do something unique. Build an environment where talented creatives, marketers, and technologists can do the best work of their career. Where they can make a home, and feel rewarded for their effort. I believe we’ve done that and I stand behind it. With our growth in particular in the last year we are reaching a tipping point where we are being recognized and rewarded for our approach. I believe that as people, how we handle adversity defines our character. So, while I was saddened by the post above, I also see this as a defining moment. I hope that my sharing above shows my character, the passion that I’ve put into our Agency and my feelings toward our team. If you’re doing research on our business I hope you can see the fallacy in the post above. If you are considering a career with us, now you’ve a glimpse of your potential future leader in action to judge. And either way, if you have any more questions, please contact me directly and I’ll do my best to help. Aaron Cuker Chief Creative Officer / CEO

Explore other reviews about Cuker

5.0
10 Dec 2022
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Pros

Amazing company with amazing people!

Cons

Remote is a bit difficult.

5.0
27 Sept 2015
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Great environment (walking distance to the beach, restaurants, cool and open workspace), exciting work (I lost count of the amount of awards we've received), and a group of talented people who makes you feel like family. What else can you ask for? One of the things I like working at Cuker is the trust and freedom you're given. You don't have to punch in on a time card or worry about having short lunches like you might with other companies. Work hours are flexible so if you want to come in before rush hour, take a lunch break to surf, then resume work refreshed, they're cool with that. The work in itself is very fulfilling and far from being repetitive. We're always using the latest technologies (whether it was Flash, ecommerce, mobile, responsive design, etc.) in our current projects, and that keeps us competitive and the job exciting.

Cons

If you're used to big corporations or government work, the health/dental benefits may not be as attractive, but I believe it's what a company our size can afford. Other than that, working near the beach does mean more traffic and harder parking at certain times. But with the flexible schedule that's usually not a big deal.

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