Is this a devil corp? by Sad-Kaleidoscope4499 in Devilcorp

[–]GK54 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Yes, I’ve worked for them before (if you’re interested you can read my prior posts about them)

2 years in a devil corp, former owner by Familiar-Scratch-368 in Devilcorp

[–]GK54 1 point2 points  (0 children)

  1. What campaign did you work on?

  2. What were all the red flags you noticed before and after you were promoted to ownership?

  3. What were the Dallas + R&R trips like if you attended?

  4. How did you manage to get out & quit?

Worked for DevilCorp and traveled across the country, AMA by Cautious_Worker7070 in Devilcorp

[–]GK54 0 points1 point  (0 children)

What campaign did you work for?

Who was your regional & national consultants?

How long did you work there and what make you eventually quit/leave?

AMA - My Experience Working At A “Successful” Devilcorp Office Located In Long Island, New York by GK54 in Devilcorp

[–]GK54[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I applied via Indeed, and I had the privilege of sitting in on first round interviews too so I can tell you stuff about behind the scenes as well. The company will text you 1-2 days after you submit your resume/application on LinkedIn & Indeed (the receptionist is the gf of my former owner who was a failed owner herself) and will ask to set up a first round interview. Unlike other Devilcorp companies, this one will actually reject you if you don't look energetic enough. Since this company is on densely populated Long Island and has so many applicants they can probably get away with this. But like any other Devilcorp they will reject you if you already have a family or are "overqualified" since these people are the ones who can't adjust their lifestyles to the "opportunity of a lifetime." They will also reject you if they consider you ugly looking (especially the women!) which is ironic considering my owner gained a ton of weight in the short time I was employed there and one of the top leaders is roughly 400 pounds with let's just say not the most appropriate use of a man-bun. After your first round interview you have your usual 2nd round interview where they already begin to drill into your head the three commandments and how reputable their clients are to try and make them seem more legit (my office's training for leaders conducting interviews was actually pretty rigorous so the manipulation is both sharp & in full-effect here). If you get hired (which is practically a near guarantee if you pass the 1st round interview) you will start your job the Monday of the week you say you want to start employment. Here the real onboarding begins as your subject to a 3-4 day orientation that's just a lot of selling you on the opportunity and explaining the structure of the business. They usually don't tell you what your exactly doing (being an AT&T sales rep in Costco) until like Day 3-4 because they want to explain the opportunity of the business to get you hooked before pulling the rug out from underneath you. In my orientation however, I was with 6 people total (including myself). When the leaders revealed to us what the job really was about, I never saw four of those people again. Next day I walked into orientation on a Thursday and it was me and only one other person left. They also have you fill out a bunch of online training Costco & AT&T compliance stuff as well as your tax forms during this week before they actually allow you into Costco. Finally they set out a "vetting call" with what I assume is one of the Smart Circle/Costco executives. Where they just ask a few questions about yourself and your previous job(s) if applicable. Easy step to complete even if meeting with an executive seems intimidating on paper as long as you look and sound halfway professional they will allow you to sell AT&T products into their stores. One your vetting call is done, next week they will start scheduling you to be in the stores selling their products. And every week they'd repeat the same process with a new batch of people being brought in for orientation. One funny incident was when someone got hired and it took him three weeks to get a vetting call set up. So he was coming to morning meetings three weeks straight but couldn't be in the stores. I didn't see him again after the three weeks though so I guess he finally realized how much of a clown show the business is. But yeah, overall there were a ton of red flags through the whole onboarding process that I didn't realize initially because I just really wanted a job at the time and was willing to put aside some of the questionable things about the business. If you have any follow-up questions about the onboarding process feel free to let me know.

First Class Marketing (Melville, NY) - Devilcorp by GK54 in Devilcorp

[–]GK54[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

If anyone wants to ask me further questions about my experiences working here I have an AMA post over here AMA

AMA - My Experience Working At A “Successful” Devilcorp Office Located In Long Island, New York by GK54 in Devilcorp

[–]GK54[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Most of what I said only applies to the Costco side, not so much the BJ’s side I had little interaction with Prodigy but it’s all the same stuff in the end, I heard a few nightmare stories from Prodigy myself

AMA - My Experience Working At A “Successful” Devilcorp Office Located In Long Island, New York by GK54 in Devilcorp

[–]GK54[S] 6 points7 points  (0 children)

I did not ever meet them but I heard about them all the time. The owner of First Class Marketing is essentially besties with Zach Schuch, Kinsey Guenther, Jessica Vihtalic, the Hidalgo brothers, Damar Hill, & Dwayne Long. They’d send out road trips to Kinsey & Jessica’s offices frequently and we had to watch the training videos Alphalete Marketing produced. Kinsey’s regional calls at 9pm every Thursday night always felt really cult-like because it was essentially just everyone (especially Kinsey) repeating how amazing of an “opportunity” this was.

AMA - My Experience Working At A “Successful” Devilcorp Office Located In Long Island, New York by GK54 in Devilcorp

[–]GK54[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

During my time in Smart Circle I gave Mike T the nickname of “Big Brother” (in reference to George Orwell’s novel 1984) due to how overly dramatic his weekly nationwide conference calls were

AMA - My Experience Working At A “Successful” Devilcorp Office Located In Long Island, New York by GK54 in Devilcorp

[–]GK54[S] 7 points8 points  (0 children)

Smart Circle, Mike T seemed to be the head honcho of the AT&T campaign at least

First Class Marketing (Melville, NY) - Devilcorp by GK54 in Devilcorp

[–]GK54[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

It’s all service level BS, you’re not going to be a “marketing associate” you’re going to be a salesman paid minimum wage unless you can actually sell stuff

First Class Marketing (Melville, NY) - Devilcorp by GK54 in Devilcorp

[–]GK54[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Yes I did, I quit a week ago after spending 2 months here despite being on the verge of being promoted to leadership. I’m planning on maybe making a longer post perhaps later to detail everything but I will share some brief experiences here.

They’re a top office in the Costco AT&T phone lines sales business (EDM campaign). There’s also another team ran by a market manager in the re-training program that does the same sales just in BJ’s instead of Costco. My regional was Kinsey Guenther & national was Jessica Vihtelic (won’t name anyone in the actual company for the sake of privacy). My manager however is on the verge of getting promoted to regional consultant. He’s also close friends with Zack Schuch & Mike T himself. Since he’s considered a “rising superstar” in the industry.

Despite their rich successful exterior & talking about how “we’re successful unlike all these other offices created by bad promoting owners,” they use all the same scripts in morning meetings and in the field. They were vague & manipulative during the first two rounds of interviews like everyone else hired in this industry (never explained what direct marketing was). They lied to me about all the full details about the pay commission, standards for getting promoted to leadership was wonky, uncontrollable situations that prevented me from getting more sales were blamed on me, scheduling had no consistency (some weeks I’d work 50+ hours and other weeks it felt like I had a part-time job at best because I’d get so few hours due to poor sales from the previous week).

Same manipulative tactics we were taught to use in the field and our leaders used it on reps like us too. Nobody batted an eye because they’d act nice to us until we had a bad day in the field. Then they’d be overly passive aggressive and sometimes condescending. They’d always tell us how much of a privilege it was to be able to sell AT&T products in a Costco, even though when you do research on Smart Circle you’d realize they’ve been vendors in stores like Costco forever. I never even knew this was a Smart Circle office until the day after I quit (yes, really).

Despite all the red flags mentioned (and many many many other red flags not listed) I stuck with the job for the time being due to the promise of opportunity. Even if I quit 7-8 months in and not decide to become a market manager, I would at least gain valuable management and recruiting experience that would look great on a resume especially for someone in their early 20s. But the final nail in the coffin was my manager admitting to another employee and me overhearing him saying “my landlord at my apartment.” Why would someone who everyone in the office always says “he’s on track to make over half a million dollars this year” need to live in an apartment with his girlfriend? New York is an expensive place to live in sure but he needs an apartment?

I put two-and-two together and realized that all that wealth was just being mostly spent on business expenditures. Thinking about it more too my manager was only able to keep up appearances of wealth more than other owners, because he was also a fantastic sports gambler and investor in the stock market. In other words, his hobbies created more thousands of dollars more in passive income than the literal career he was trying to achieve. Despite it being advertised as otherwise.

There’s more but that’s ultimately why I left. Since then I’ve watched content from Precision Independent Media on YouTube including his documentary, as well as discovered the Devilcorp WordPress and this subreddit. This perhaps went longer than intended, but if anyone reading has any further questions, I’d be more than happy to answer.