Tell me about your Christmas/Holiday Bonus

[Systematic Chaos]

20. Only cash holiday bonus I ever got was from working at a 7-11, believe it or not.

The owner gave every employee a cash bonus at the end of the year, based upon job performance and seniority. For the one Christmas I was there, I got $300 and I'd only been there 8 months. This was in 1990. The long-timers all got upwards of $500. Back then only two slots on the payroll included people who hadn't worked there at least 5 years. Me, and one other random, rotating person.

The owner also did profit sharing, and my friend who worked there about 15 years got a check for nearly $30,000 when he quit due to pain issues from being on his feet so much, maybe a year before the owner sold the store. You don't see that kind of thing every day in the c-store business!

Funny thing was, this was a "neighborhood" type of 7-11 which didn't sell gas and only did cash business. But every summer day it was still nearly impossible to keep the cooler stocked with beer and soda for more than an hour. They sold probably 200 hot dogs and 100 platters of nachos every day. Cups for the fountain had to be stocked not daily but twice per shift. Replenishing the candy aisle every week when the shipment came in took the owner's daughter over half a shift. HUGE volume.



Contrast that to my last job at a now-closed Strip casino here in Las Vegas. The company (MGM Grand was the final owner of the place before it got imploded to make room for the still-unfinished City Center) paid no sick time and a maximum of only two weeks of vacation per year. For either Thanksgiving or Christmas (can't recall which any longer and frankly don't give a shit) you were given the option of either a frozen turkey or three fairly small catering pies. Many employees gathered up the food from those who didn't want it and would donate it all to our local food banks.