employer cover photo
employer logo
employer logo

Columbia Distributing Company

Engaged Employer

Columbia Distributing Company reviews

3.2

42% would recommend to a friend

(310 total reviews)
avatar

Chris Steffanci

57% approve of CEO

40% positive business outlook

Columbia Distributing Company has an employee rating of 3.2 out of 5 stars, based on 310 company reviews on Glassdoor which indicates that most employees have a good working experience there. The Columbia Distributing Company employee rating is in line with the average (within 1 standard deviation) for employers within the Retail & Wholesale industry (3.5 stars).

Reviews by job title

310 reviews
2.0
Mar 30, 2018

Growth at any cost...Beware!!!

Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Decent benefits and culture. Great co-workers!! This section would have been loaded 2-3 years ago. Keep watching the reviews, they will continue to get worse.

Cons

Executive team and most department leaders. Over the past few years, its has become obvious that growth is more important than company culture, employee moral and work-life balance. This unfortunaite trend has only been accelerated by the retirement of Gregg Christiansen. The new CEO is ruthless in his drive to grow the company and make a name for himself. While he often talks about maintaining culture and the value of all the employees, he is hiring and promoting an executive team that is requiring all departments to sustain a workload that is honestly unreasonable. If you can't or don't want to work 60-70+ hours a week to meet the new demand, no problem, they will let you go any find someone else that will. Work-life balance is gone and the company is quickly loosing the talent required to get them to the next level, which ultimately puts more work on those that stay. This isn't a sustainable business model and Columbia is in trouble if they don't change their ways.

1.0
May 22, 2017
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Worked around my part time schedule while I went to school. Work independently and unsupervised for the most part.

Cons

Agree with the other reviews that they over work you and under pay you! Other companies pay around $16 an hour after 6 mths. Columbia will bring you up to around $13 after the same amount of time. They do not listen to employees or hire enough help to get the job done! They also are NOT safety oriented as they like to lead you to believe. A member of my team cut his leg almost to the bone and they refused to get him medical attention until the supervisor arrived on site and filled out the proper paperwork. About 1:15 later, he was finally allowed to go to the e.r. I've never been treated or seen others treated so poorly as I have with Columbia distribution! The longest I have ever worked with anyone on my team before they left for another company is 4 months. Very high turn over rate

2.0
Oct 9, 2016
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Lots of great people to work with - the majority of the sales reps, office staff and lower management are great friendly people.

Cons

Unless you are upper management you get the vibe that you are very easily replaceable. Upper management very rarely interfaces the non higher ups and when they do it comes across as obviously disingenuous and forced. It is a common occurrence to overhear employees discussing that they feel undervalued and nothing more than a number in a spreadsheet to upper management. Columbia is notorious for not paying their employees enough, asking for a raise is like pulling teeth. I have seen multiple exemplary employees given 5-50 cent raises when the company is doing excellent financially. It is extremely common for sales reps and other positions to work long extra hours inside accounts improving relationships at the cost of sacrificing time with their own families.

Viewing 1 - 3 of 310 Reviews

Glassdoor has 318 Columbia Distributing Company reviews submitted anonymously by Columbia Distributing Company employees. Read employee reviews and ratings on Glassdoor to decide if Columbia Distributing Company is right for you.