I *really* want to like Pet Food Center since I love supporting local businesses. However, the past…read morefew times that my husband and I have been in to the Newburgh location, we've had some unfortunate issues regarding the employees there.
As for my experience, I went in a month or two ago to get some cat food, and when I walked in, there didn't seem to be anybody working. I came to find out there were three employees (2 women and 1 man) at the back of the store hanging out and chatting, which I initially brushed off since it was during the evening hours and they might've not had much to do. What did bother me was the language they were using was shockingly foul and just overall off-putting. They didn't seem concerned there were customers in the store. Now, I'm a very off-the-cuff kind of person and am certainly not one to care about strong language, but when I'm at my job, my coworkers and I understand there's a time and a place, and these employees didn't seem to care who heard them. These three employees were also clearly discussing their manager/store owner and coworkers in a *very* poor manner, along with the aforementioned excessive cursing. When I got the cat food I needed, nobody was at the counter, and I had to get the employees' attention a few times to get someone to ring me up due to their conversing in the back of the store.
Additionally, my husband had nearly the exact same experience the other day. He went in an hour before closing (so it's not like he arrived 5 minutes before they shut the store down for the day), and the closed sign was already put up. Double checking the store hours, he tried the door, and it was unlocked, so he walked in. Again, the same three employees (2 women and 1 man) were working and had gathered at the back of the store. My husband didn't receive any acknowledgement when he entered the store, and when he couldn't find what he was looking for, he tried asking these employees for help. All three of them, still at the back of the store, ignored him despite him saying two or three times: "Excuse me, can you please help me?" One of the employees finally noticed him and asked "Can I help you?" in a frustrated, rude tone of voice. He also noted that these employees were openly speaking about their coworkers and, especially, the manager in the same extremely disparaging and snide way that I experienced-- foul language included.
Overall, we were both uncomfortable with our recent experiences due to the behavior of these workers, so this is the reason for my one star review. I initially wrote off my experience from a month or two ago because I had been in to the Newburgh location of Pet Food Center before and never had a problem. After my husband told me what happened when he went in the other day, I knew it wasn't just a one-time occurrence since our experiences had been so similar--especially since I never bothered to mention my previous experience to him before then.
I felt it was important that I write this review (sorry for the lengthy-ness!) because the one star rating might get the attention of management so they can mend the situation; these three employees are clearly disgruntled and behaving unprofessionally. I doubt the manager wants their employees speaking so badly them and other workers as well as being so rude and vulgar in general. I don't mind if employees at a business don't greet me when I walk in a store, but these workers were behaving as if they were not at work at all. Again, I'd love to support Pet Food Center and would be happy to return once this issue is amended. Just a concerned community member here that would hate to see a local business suffer due to a few grumpy employees!
