Complaint Review: Labels Lab - Santee California

The founder of a company called LabelsLab, based in Santee and has expanded the office Las Vegas and New York. They mainly hires sales persons but also graphic designers, sales are put on 1099 and offers a base salary (normally about $500 a week), graphics/admin gets put on w2 but is well below industry standard. They justifies by stating the pay is "above minimum wage". They incentivizes by offering % on profits of sales and services, to sales, graphics and admin team. Calling them "Bonuses".

The sales team, which has the highest turn around, gets 2 months of "training" typically from another sales person. However, their training is often interrupted and undermined by the boss, giving contradictory information and telling the trainer that they don't know what they are doing. New sales people are often left confused and unsure about their capabilities. When they are unable to perform the over blown expectations from the boss they are told to work from home and takes away their compensation and he says he is "cutting them loose", and "if they care, they will be successful".

If a new sales person is in the process of obtaining a client the boss or manager will intervene and give some (often made up) reason why they do not deserve that client and will give it to random senior sales person. The boss will also randomly pick and choose clients to swap from sales person to sales person. Out of fear of losing their jobs, sales people do not bring up issues of favoritism or harassment. If they do, the boss will fire them, not pay them out and belittle them in front of the other employees. When a sales person leave, the company will save every contact and have more experience sales team reach out to "Close the deal". If a sales person spent any money for travel, supplies, etc they will not be compensated even though the boss promises reimbursement. If a sales person has any issue, the boss will either fire them in a storm of abuse and humiliation or make their work more difficult to point of quitting.

The graphics/office admin team, who are used to help get artwork from clients (provided by the sales team) to production. The production team is overseas, does not speak English, and operates with different standards than American standards. The boss is the only person able to contact with the production team. No one fully understand the process and has difficulty explaining situations and crumbles when the production team pushes back. If/when mistakes happen, the graphics team is the first to be blamed regardless of reason. The company often charges clients to redesign "fix" clients art or create artwork from scratch, which is never mentioned when being hired and when given the new responsibilities the only compensation given. When pressured about that if they are given compensation it is referred to as a "bonus pay".  

The admin (one person), who helps place orders with production, is given broken instructions and "training" is often coupled with expectation on how to do everything properly and right away. Admin eventually is responsible to place orders and contact clients, turning them into sales people, with no proper training or instructions. They are also not given an increase in compensation or a % of the sale, as opposed to the sales team. New duties are added and taken away at a whim, and consistency is... there is no consistency. The boss will promises a % of each sale, but it is much below the sales team % and can be taken away whenever they feel like it.

The boss does not understand the production process and will blame the graphics team for any reason, he will then "take away" any bonus he had promised in the past. If he cannot to that he will play favorites with the individuals within the team, changing titles and levels of trust monthly. He will also have private "meetings" with individuals, away from staff ensuring off the record agreements. The meetings are often to discuss other team members are underhanded, unmotivated, lazy, or any reason for that individual to "have his (Stas) back" over anyone else including their own. Agreements during these meetings are rarely kept on his end however he will quote that person to their face in front of staff.

After Labels Lab Harassment When a person leaves, regardless if they quite or are fired. The boss will do everything he thinks he can to "ruin their life". He will file police reports claiming the person stole property, even if they did not. He will call landlords to inform them that person no longer works for him. He will deny unemployment. He will threaten the person with lawsuits. He will call the person and leave threatening messages. He will email the person in attempts to humiliate and belittle the person. He will attempt to contact new employers to belittle the persons integrity. He will even attack former employer’s family, including husbands, wives, significant others and even children.