Used to be a great company (HQ) - Anonymous employee PetSmart Employee Review

1.0
15 Jul 2016
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Easy to be passionate about what you do, helping animals. Team-members seem to care about each other. You can bring your dogs to work.

Cons

Overbearing work schedule, extremely unrealistic expectations of turnaround/deadlines on projects. Expectation that nights and weekends belong to the company. You are made to feel guilty if you use a vacation day to spend time with your family. Only way to be promoted is to have come from Payless Shoe Source. Long-time PetSmart associates are overlooked and "under qualified" for positions they have been training for for years, but if you came from Payless you can expect to be promoted within six months. All the compassion is gone from the company and they are very comfortable with burning out associates to the point where people quit out of anger. They are of the mentality that anyone at anytime is replaceable and they would rather hire someone new than invest in company culture. All of these things in more were relayed to HR on multiple occasions and by many associates during exit interviews but they are a closed door. They stick to their old accolades received while a publicly traded company (Top places to work in Phoenix, etc.) despite the fact that the company and culture that received those awards are dead and buried. Management has no clue what the next level of management above them is looking for, causes constant rework and redundancies.

Explore other reviews about PetSmart

5.0
8 Jan 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Good staff, good management here

Cons

Not many here. All good

1.0
2 Jun 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

The company pushes for more and more from the bottom level employees without better pay. I worked there before the restructuring and; not much can make me cry, but working here sure did, even back then. I can’t imagine how anxiety inducing it must be to work there now. Animal welfare is a complete non-concern. The only thing that’s pushed is sell, sell, sell. It’s borderline dystopian. Bad management seems to be a common issue, not only from my experience, but many others’ as well. I worked until I was an exhausted sweaty mess to make sure everything in pet care or, when I groomed, the salon, was cleaned to perfection as expected of me (and I reiterate: “me,” because these standards were not expected of my co-workers, just me) and overall felt very unseen. The only times I did feel “seen,” was when mistakes were made. Work was treated like boot camp. A co-worker that was subtley targeting/bullying me, and even started rumors accusing me of racist remarks(!!!), was promoted and anything I reported was downplayed because they were friends with the assistant manager. Working here was an overall traumatizing experience.

Cons

Employees are expected to be work-robots

avatar
PetSmart Response
1w
We’re disappointed to hear that your experience didn’t reflect what we aim to create for our associates, and we appreciate you taking the time to share your feedback. We invite you to contact the CareSmart line at 1-800-738-4693 so we can learn more and see how we can support you. Thank you.
See reviews by: Helpful|Rating|Date|All