hey guys so today I'm gonna be talking
about my experience working at American
Eagle I was a sales associate there from
August 2014 to August 2015 so I guess
just a disclaimer I don't actually work
there anymore but I've worked there
pretty recently and I did work there for
a full year so what I have to say is
pretty up-to-date if you guys are
interested in finding out more about how
I got my job at American Eagle and like
the hiring and interview process I'm
going to link a video right here and in
the description that I made earlier
talking about all of that jazz so I
started working at an American Eagle in
August 2014 and when I started working
there it was my first job and I was 16 I
remember the first day I came into work
I was like scared shitless I was so
terrified they had me up in the front
folding clothes and greeting customers
and telling them about the sales and
promotions and stuff but I was so scared
to talk to all these strangers my heart
was like literally beating out of my
chest and also my first day I actually
forgot to clock in I didn't know how to
use the computer system to clock in
normally at American Eagle you clock in
on the computers that they use to check
people out but I had no idea I thought
it was being clocked in automatically or
something which was dumb so I worked in
the front for a full hour before I
realized that I hadn't clocked in and
then when somebody told me that I needed
to be clocked in I ran over to the
registers and tried to clock in leaving
the front unattended which apparently is
like a big no-no in retail which I also
didn't know so my manager started
yelling at me and basically it was like
not a hot first day but I'm just telling
you guys this story so if you're you're
at your first day at a job or at your
first day in American Eagle
know that it's probably not as bad as
mine and it's definitely okay to mess up
with that story out of the way I guess
I'll move on to my duties as a sales
associate when you start out they have
you do more basic tasks that take less
training so like greeting customers
folding clothes when I first started out
they actually put me in the back sorting
out clearance a lot probably because
they realized after my first day that I
was really really scared of greeting
customers eventually after like a month
of working there they put me on my first
closing shift loading for those of you
who don't know is basically just having
a shift at the end of the day where you
have to fold the clothes and stay after
the customers are gone and kind of make
sure the store is all in order I
personally really like closing it kind
of sucks
you have to stay really late at the
store but it's really nice because you
don't have to talk to customers and I
store they let me get out my phone and
my earbuds and listen to music so that
was really nice you could just kind of
jam out while you fold the clothes for a
couple hours and then after working
there for a couple months they started
putting me on the fitting rooms which is
definitely a task for like more
experienced workers basically I would
take the clothes from the customers who
would line up in the fitting rooms and
escort them over to a fitting room write
their name on the door and whiteboard
marker I would also have to let them
know that they could press the button on
the inside of the fitting room if they
needed help grab people sizes and most
of all do all of the go backs basically
put back all of the clothes that people
had tried on in the fitting rooms a lot
of people actually kind of hate doing go
backs because the clothes can pile up
and it can be kind of stressful to fold
all of these clothes run out put them
back in their right places in the right
size order in the store before any
customers get to the thing rooms and you
need to attend to them but it turns out
I was absolutely pretty good at it
and after that they kept putting me on
fitting rooms I actually really liked
the fitting rooms because I didn't have
to go up to customers and bother them
about sales and tell them things that
they didn't really want to hear they
were coming to me and I could help them
out if they needed any and I could also
help keep the store and order also it
was really nice because when it wasn't
busy or I was really tired I could kind
of just sit on the fitting room stools
and text discreetly about nine months
into working at American Eagle which is
pretty late for most people normally
they do this earlier they trained me how
to check people out on the register they
just scheduled me for a shift in the
morning with a bunch of other associates
and kind of went through all of the
things that you needed to know about
checking people out but it turns out I
was actually really bad at checking
people out so they took me off register
within like a week that's because kind
of the main duty of the cashier is other
than like obviously checking people out
is to convince people to sign up for
American Eagle credit cards and some
people are really good at it and if
you're good at convincing people and
comfortable convincing people to sign up
for a credit card then you can really
use the job to your advantage and you
probably be really good at the job but I
was super uncomfortable trying to
persuade people to get credit cards
because I knew that none of them wanted
it and probably for some people it
wasn't a good financial decision so
luckily my manager has kind of figured
that out there like a little bit
solty on me that they had bothered
training me and I didn't like working on
register but then after that they put me
back on fitting rooms how much American
Eagle pays obviously depends on your
state in your city when I started out
they paid me $8 an hour which was 50
cents above my state's minimum wage
probably if you live in a city or state
with higher minimum wage like above 850
they'll probably just pay you minimum
wage though every February for sales
associates who have been working at the
store for around six months sometimes
that's a little bit flexible I think I
was only working there for four or five
months they'll give you a raise
but don't get too excited the raises are
actually pretty crappy I got raised 2%
from $8 an hour to 816 an hour which I
suppose is better than no raise at all
but 2% doesn't even account for
inflation every August in the
back-to-school season American Eagle
does gene expert and stylist promotions
yes that's what they're called and gene
expert is a pretty lame title but that's
what I ended up being basically if
you've worked there for at least a
couple months and you're pretty
dedicated sales associate you have a
good chance of being promoted to gene
expert unfortunately you don't actually
get any raises being promoted to gene
expert or stylist but you do get some
perks you get a really fancy nametag you
go to some meeting where they tell you
about all the gene styles the main
advantage though is that you get a
better discount which I will talk about
now so basically the baseline employee
discount is 40% off everything regular
price and 25% off everything that's
already marked down however every time
they do a floor set so that's every time
they get new merchandise normally it
happens every month or two months but
sometimes there's like weirdly long
periods of time in between floor sets
all sales associates get 12 regular
price items in the store for 60% off in
addition if you're a gene expert or a
stylist every floor set you'll get 80%
off three items and let me tell you
getting 80% off is the [ __ ] it makes $50
jeans ten dollars which is just amazing
and probably getting 80% off is like the
biggest Pro of working at American Eagle
now on to scheduling like most big
retailers American Eagle does their
scheduling every single week which can
be really annoying if you're trying to
plan ahead basically you give them your
set availability per
and then every week on Thursday they'll
come out with the new schedule for the
next week starting that Sunday so it's
really annoying because sometimes you'll
only get three days notice like if
you're picking up your schedule on
Thursday and then you're scheduled that
Sunday of what time you're working
another really annoying thing about it
is that their schedules are only in
paper form they don't email them to you
or text them to you or anything and my
managers would get really annoyed if you
tried to call and ask for your schedule
so most of the time you had to partner
up with another sales associate or just
drive all the way to the store and pick
up your schedule the worst thing of all
about scheduling at American Eagle
though is Collins and let me tell you
Collins are basically the worst thing
that's happened to sales associates
since they started opening scores on
Thanksgiving basically it's this
half-assed shift where you're given a
lot of time and you have to call the
store an hour before that a lot of time
and they'll tell you whether they need
you or not and like 80 to 90% of the
time they never need you but you still
need to be available for them just in
case they decide in an hour that they
need you at the store that being said
American Eagle is pretty flexible with
scheduling most of their employees are
students in high school or college so
they generally are really understanding
if you need to take a couple of weeks
off to work on your college applications
or work on your finals and midterms
another really nice thing is that if
you're working there in the summer for
example and that you have to go off to
college but you like to keep working
with them during the breaks they can
take you on as a seasonal Oso see it
again whenever you have breaks so for
example if you're coming back for a
winter break or spring break or summer
you can just call them two weeks in
advance and they'll put you on the
schedule again and you can get a couple
weeks pay and start up at your job again
at your hometown really easily besides
the discount probably the best thing
about working at American Eagle with
just my coworkers they were always
really really nice people and really
energetic um not a lot of like kind of
kind of [ __ ] sales associates that you
get sometimes once you get to know
everyone it makes working a lot more fun
and you can like joke around over the
headsets and kind of mess around and
stuff like that so yeah I've made some
really good friends from my co-workers
there and it's a really good place to
meet people in terms of management my
managers are kind of scary or at least I
thought they were when I first met them
they always made really really strong
eye contact with me which is probably
the scariest thing but a shot a 16 year
old could
ever encounter but once I got to know
them I guess they weren't too bad they
were kind of bossy sometimes and really
really pushed credit cards but most
managers do and I guess that's just
something you have to deal with so I
guess in summary the pay is not too hot
you do work really hard folding clothes
and running around and helping customers
but you're surrounded by awesome people
cute clothes at a really good discount
and in the end especially if you're a
student or if it's your first job it's
not a bad job all right so that's all
the wisdom I have to dispel on you guys
today thank you so much for watching if
you like this video don't forget to give
it a thumbs up and subscribe and comment
down below if you have any questions
about my time working at American Eagle
see you guys soon bye
[Music]