It’s become increasingly common for teenagers to work part-time jobs in their high school years. Granada High School is full of students holding part-time jobs, but not all teen jobs are made equally. From sketchy employers, misleading hiring ads, and terrible management, teen job horror stories are not hard to find.  We asked teenage employees to speak honestly about 5 common jobs teenagers hold.  Here are 5 teen jobs starting with the best and ending with the worst.

Inside sources from these workplaces will remain anonymous in this article. More than one employee or ex-employee source was used for each workplace. Both Granada and Livermore High students were interviewed to cast a wide net of teen jobs hiring in Livermore, California. Opinions expressed by sources are theirs alone and do not reflect the opinions of The Pomegranate, the author, or Granada High.

In N Out

With multiple locations across the state of California, In N Out hires high school-age teenagers to work as “store associates”. What this actually means is that a new hire is trained to work every position except for cook. Store associates are responsible for being cashiers, working on the soda line, taking orders in the drive-thru, handing out food, making shakes, and occasionally cooking fries. In N Out’s starting wage is $20 an hour. Store associates receive one free meal while on shift and 15% off food at the store they work at while off the clock.

According to ex and current employees, the starting wage is $20 an hour but you may receive corporate America’s favorite backhanded compliment, a 25 or 50 cent raise. An anonymous ex or current employee said, “There is never a single moment where you are not doing something, every single job that isn’t cooking a burger is done by us, if there are no customers at the register, I’m cleaning or making fries.”

Employees are not allowed to have their phones on them at work and must turn them into the back room. Employees are also not allowed to have visible tattoos, more than 2 piercings on their ears, and no earrings that aren’t studs. Employees do not get tips. Overall, the high starting wage may make the strict rules worth it to many, “we get the best hourly in town and we get free company events in Southern and Northern California; last summer we got a company picnic at Hurricane Harbor in Six Flags with free food and free rides.” The overall agreement was that the management was excellent.

Starbucks

The giant coffee chain, Starbucks, hires teenagers for the position of barista. Anyone age 16 and up is invited to apply, and job listings in Livermore, California claim to pay $16-$18.16 an hour. Baristas work as cashiers and coffee bars, making any one of the cold or hot drinks Starbucks sells. Baristas receive access to free drinks and pastries while on shift, 30% off while off the clock, and interestingly, free Spotify premium and 30% off Skechers shoes. 

According to ex and current employees, the wage starts at $15.50 and gets raised to $16 after some time. That $16-$18.16 figure is misleading. After training you’ll be tasked to learn how to make every drink by memory, a process that’s, “not so bad” according to an ex or current employee. Employees state, “It gets busy on weekends and you’re making back-to-back drinks all day on those shifts.” The management is looked upon well by employees, although you may be asked to work a shift at a different Starbucks in town for a day every once in a while. Out of all the Starbucks in Livermore, the worst one to work at is on Portola Avenue, “The managers there treat Starbucks like it’s a sacred institution and follow all the little made-up rules that make employees’ lives harder and more expensive but not the rules that make employees lives easier, if you’re gonna work at Starbucks make sure that’s not your main location.” Employees receive cash tips every 2 weeks from Starbucks as they take the card and tip jar money and split it evenly averaging about $50 per employee. Overall, employees agreed the management was great, excluding Starbucks on Portola Avenue.

McDonald’s

Mcdonald’s is an iconic fast food chain, and it’s most likely what you picture when someone says minimum wage job. A “crew member” is a position available to teenagers at this employer. Just like a teen job at most other fast food places, crew members work every position that’s not managerial or pertains to cooking and assembling food. Being a cashier, bagging food, calling orders, making drinks and cooking fries are all fair game. The crew member position claims to pay $15.50-$16 an hour. Crew members get a 50% discount on food, free soda while on shift, and 25% off food while off the clock.

According to ex and current employees, the wage is correct at $15.50 starting and $16 after some months. The hiring process is described as grueling with multiple weeks of coming in a few times to do training on a tablet for 2 hours at a time. After finishing training, you’re then trained to work the register and start working shifts, kind of. “They hardly train employees at all they just throw them somewhere and start yelling at them for not doing exactly what they’re supposed to,” said an ex or current employee. The workplace is described as busy on weekends and Fridays, but there are some moments of peace during weekdays, “There are a long line of managers and none are really that bad, some like to yell at everything though it’s kind of funny.” The workplace is rough for new hires but a very relaxed environment for experienced employees. The general agreement was that the management varied between managers but was overall just okay.

Nursing Home

Located in Pleasanton, California, Stoneridge Creek is a “senior living facility”; it’s a nursing home. The workplace employs teenagers to work as food servers to the residents when meals are being dispensed. The servers rotate jobs between being a host that seats the residents as they come for their meal and being the server that delivers their food and drinks to their tables. The food server position claims to pay $17-$18 an hour and you must pass a drug screening prior to starting work.

According to anonymous ex and current employees, the facility will ask you how much you want to be paid hourly between $16-$18 and after obviously saying $18 you’ll receive between $17-$18. There are no tips as the site is technically not an actual restaurant. Day-to-day employees can expect to give out food to senior citizens and occasionally encounter agitated residents. The senior citizens often complain loudly about the food, the speed of the cooks, where they sit, and refills. A teenager working at Stoneridge Creek said, “The residents really like arguing with staff, the management has a lot of petty rules they need you to enforce like no taking food as leftovers which means you’ll definitely be yelled at by an 80-year-old, sometimes you’ll be forced [to] be yelled at by someone and they die the next week which isn’t fun either.” Overall, there was an agreement that the management is extremely poor.

Shoe Palace

Shoe Palace hires teenagers for the position of “part-time associate” which means you’ll be tasked with greeting people at the door, acting as a cashier, acting as a salesperson for shoes, and organizing shoe boxes in the back of the store. Shoe Palace claims to pay $15.50 an hour. 

According to ex and current employees, the pay is $15.50 an hour. Day to day, employees can expect to stand around and tidy the place up, occasionally helping a customer. On weekends when it’s busy, expect to help multiple people at a time without help. “I rotted away on weekdays but worked extremely hard on weekends while my manager sat down and scrolled through their phone,” an anonymous ex or current employee said. Customers are asked who helped them at the register, but you will not receive a reward or commission, employees are reprimanded if their numbers are low. Overall, employees described the management as awful and lazy.