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submitted 3 days ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

asked for a raise (im the only employee at a small cosmetics company. i handle the manufacturing, labeling, packing, and shipping, as well as keeping up inventory and keeping the place in order. basically everything) and my boss responds by trying to gaslight me, pulling this “we’re a small business 🥺” bullshit

he just bought a 60,000 dollar car and is taking his second vacation of the year next week

he keeps trying to hold “a week of personal time” i had to go on strike by myself to earn, “paid winter break” etc over my head. all shit that the government forces you to give your employees in every other country on the planet. america is a shit hole with no workers rights and it allows the parasitic small business tyrant class feel like they’re doing something good by offering the bare minimum. literally “i treat my slaves nicely” shit

sorry yall just wanted to rant. fuck america and work under capitalism

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[-] [email protected] 69 points 3 days ago

small business tyrants are the worst. the ones who pull shit like "i can't afford an extra $120/week" while living in luxury, taking vacations, and making you do everything are total "don't believe your lying eyes" type of psychos. i hate how common it is.

i have managed to rat fuck 1 or 2. the sweetest plum is to secretly find other work while pretending you have become complacent about your job and time it so you can ghost their asses right as you are needed most. it is very easy to lull these people into security, because they think they are genius masterminds already. meanwhile, they flail hard when you take all the knowledge of processes and critical relationships and walk with zero notice. don't delete files or destroy property, but maybe don't be so great about keeping records or whatever for the last week once your new gig has a start date. whoops! doing a crappy job isn't illegal!

only ever give them a single sentence in reply when they ask where you are on that first day you're doing the new job, preferably as text something like "i am pursuing a different professional opportunity, best of luck." and then never say anything else, no matter what. i recommend disabling notifications from them. they will 100% have a narcissistic meltdown, blow up your phone, and hopefully text a shitload. all that stuff can be shared on socials, you can make reviews on google and glassdoor absolutely smearing the place with links to the texts they will send trying to bully you.

it really doesn't take much to poison the well against recruiting future employees if you've got a few texts of them being abusive, which this sort of gambit is certain to cause in this type of employer.

probably my only real advice for this to anyone wanting to replicate it is to temper your expectations on finding a better job. it's probably not gonna happen in a week, but if you only apply for a new job once every week or so, that's a reasonable tempo to keep up. and it's weird the way jobs pop up randomly, so the longer period of time you're looking is a better search than trying to find all the available jobs in a short window of time. and you'll be in a strong negotiating position, because you already have a job, so you won't have to accept something that sucks. it's a slow burn revenge. the wise fear the anger of the patient.

anyway, i hope you get a chance to stick it to this shit wizard.

[-] [email protected] 16 points 2 days ago

lol not really a “small business”, but I worked at Best Buy before I could find work in my field, and the onboarding was aggressive in reminding you that they’re an “at-will employer”. Which is what I reminded them when I showed up for my shift to inform them I wouldn’t be doing it or any others. ✌️

[-] [email protected] 4 points 2 days ago

this is a great comment and i appreciate all your advice, thank you comrade

[-] [email protected] 60 points 3 days ago

I'm going to go against the grain here and say DO NOT QUIT.

First you need to copy every spreadsheet and every document they have for your new startup. That and their list of contacts on Salesforce if you have it/they use it. You don't have to use their docs etc it'll just come in handy having them as reference when you redo the work yourself because you can literally do the job this company is doing as 1 person.

Should take a week or so. Make sure you've got everything. Do not pass up anything, you'll regret it later.

[-] [email protected] 26 points 3 days ago

If there wasn't a noncompete agreement, you don't even need to quit until you're sure your clone of their company is working out.

[-] [email protected] 11 points 2 days ago

I would say don't even quit after you've done all that. Build your base while working there. You can easily get supplies from them. They sound so checked out.

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[-] [email protected] 5 points 2 days ago

sadly i dont have access to spreadsheets and documents but i do know the names of most of the stores we sell to by heart so i could easily come up with a list of potential clients if i ever decided to go that route

[-] [email protected] 8 points 2 days ago

Get the access. Then leave. What timeline might be involved in that? 3-6 months? I bet you can invent a creative reason to get access and "help".

[-] [email protected] 9 points 2 days ago

lol you’re right, if i framed it as myself taking on more work he would give me access probably

[-] [email protected] 6 points 2 days ago

Move fast though bc I guarantee they're already thinking about how to replace them

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[-] [email protected] 20 points 2 days ago

you hold all the cards here. find another job (not necessarily right away but start looking) that you could tolerate and tell him you're gonna bounce if he doesn't bump you up to $25/hr.

if you have another job offer in hand you can really turn the screws on him, especially since you know the business is profitable enough (that $60k car could have been an additional $30/hr to you over the course of a year, assuming you work 40 hours a week). so ask for a huge raise because the number can only go down during negotiations, not up

then go back to looking for jobs but use your shiny new hourly rate as a baseline for negotiating with other employers and leave your current boss in the lurch, ideally as quickly as possible after winning the negotiation.

get his ass. show this dipshit no mercy, it's not half as bad as what he'd do to you if he could

[-] [email protected] 20 points 2 days ago

awful

hope your boss dies a violent and painful death ❤️

[-] [email protected] 13 points 2 days ago

lmaoo thank you comrade. im thankful for this community. most places i made a post like this, it would just be a bunch of boot lickers and peons saying “well you get paid time off! what more do you want! 16/hr isnt bad! its HIS business!!”

[-] [email protected] 14 points 2 days ago

Reminds me of an ex sitting in the ER getting blown up by his bosses with a yacht, gated community, private school for their kid, wanting him to return to work the same day the boss mashed him up with heavy equipment. Tfooh.

[-] [email protected] 9 points 2 days ago

i hate these people so much. the entitlement of these greedy pigs just blows my mind. i have no sympathy for any of these people.

[-] [email protected] 4 points 2 days ago

The sad part is, he went back the last couple of hours.i believe he was making $10/he at the time.

[-] [email protected] 31 points 3 days ago

"sorry, i can't afford to pay you more (i enjoy my luxurious lifestyle you're supporting)" - porky-happy

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[-] [email protected] 33 points 3 days ago

Seriously though, $60,000 car and one employee?

[-] [email protected] 34 points 3 days ago

yeah they make bank because the product has low cost to produce and a high profit plus only one employee (my dumb ass) facilitating every step of the process

[-] [email protected] 19 points 3 days ago

Why not just quit and work for yourself doing the same thing and make all that money for yourself?

[-] [email protected] 11 points 2 days ago

the initial investment it would take prevents me

i know the formula and the manufacturing process- which we’re the only company with this process. i could use basic kitchen equipment to replicate the product but its the initial cost of the ingredients. if i could afford that initial cost, assuming i could actually sell the product it would become profitable very fast tho

[-] [email protected] 12 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

I would try to find a friend and start a co-op, to lessen the burden. Or if you know the start up capital costs, go to a bank and get a business loan. You can literally explain that you know the entire business and that will allow them to get their beaks wet on something that has already been proven to be a profitable enterprise, they love that kind of backdoor bullshit. The only thing stopping it is if they own a patent or copyright in the actual product.

[-] [email protected] 1 points 2 days ago

Do you live close to any of these places?

https://seedcommons.org/our-network

Because this is exactly the sort of thing that this org aims to do, to give people like you the startup capital to enter the market.

[-] [email protected] 2 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

I would start making a list of all your customers and that way, if you do go for it, you can take that business with you (or at least attempt to). If you do it, I would quit when your boss is on vacation to fuck them over even harder.

[-] [email protected] 1 points 2 days ago

there are small business loans that are usually cheap govt backed programs

[-] [email protected] 15 points 3 days ago

FR. Since you're running their business for them already it should be relatively straight-forward. Easy enough to find out who their suppliers are, given I imagine you probably manage shipping and receiving as well. Accounting you may have to learn a thing or two, but nothing you can't figure out. Fuck these leeches.

[-] [email protected] 8 points 3 days ago

Start stealing it and sell it on ebay

[-] [email protected] 6 points 2 days ago

sadly not a good plan. i had initially planned to do this when i first started working here to get some side money but this dude is neurotic and scowers the internet to find people possibly selling knockoffs of the product or selling it unauthorized or anything

[-] [email protected] 11 points 3 days ago

Sounds like a dope-ass margin. Or tax evasion. Could always be tax evasion.

[-] [email protected] 5 points 2 days ago

just big margins. an ingredient order is placed about every 6 months. the product is just made with various oils and waxes. while the order will costa few thousand dollars, in one day i produce thousands of products all of which individually sell for enough that one day of production will easily pay for an entire 6 month’s worth of ingredients.

on that note, his wife accidentally fucked up once and gave me an order that didnt have the prices removed, so i could see what they sell everything for and the total amount of the order. one medium-small sized order i ship out pays for my entire month’s salary. im packing dozens upon dozens of these orders every month, with some larger ones that will likely be about a year’s worth of my salary coming in every couple months

[-] [email protected] 28 points 3 days ago

Sounds like he ended up in a situation where 100% of his employees are irreplacable, aware of it and radicalized against him. Pretty sure that's one of the pages in the Big Book of Business where you're supposed to draw a frowny face and (if you can) write "No".

[-] [email protected] 7 points 2 days ago

Not really.

It sounds like the boss is saying he can find someone else to do this for $17 an hour.

[-] [email protected] 6 points 2 days ago

that is what he’s saying, but he would quickly realize that’s not true once i left. to be honest im not sure be even believes it to be the case- the few people he’s brought in didn’t even last a year on the longer end because he’s so neurotic and the pay to work ratio isnt there. then all the work those people were doing just falls back on me and i make the same amount i always did.

he wants to pay teenager wages for adult work. the reason i’m even still here is because ive been here for almost 10yrs, its the job i got when i first moved back to the country and was rooming with my sibling and our friend, so my rent was like 200/mo at the time. i was okay with the lower pay because the lax structure made it worth it for me since i didnt need much money anyway. 10yrs later, im essentially running his warehouse and he’s still basically paying me the same. a teenager’s wage. he wont find an adult to come in and do this job for 17/hr, i know that for a fact. and no teenager can handle this job, i also know that for a fact.

so im not sure if he really believes that or is saying it as a bargaining chip

[-] [email protected] 1 points 2 days ago

If you're essentially running the warehouse, there should be lots of data you can get your hands on, about how much is getting shipped out (which you can then use to compute the conpany's gross revenue).

Learn everything you can, while you have the opening to: the better picture you have of the company and its trade secrets, the more leverage you have in negotiating, and the easier it ends up being to duplicate their business if you want to go for that option.

[-] [email protected] 2 points 2 days ago

Yeah. I don't mean this in a condescending or dismissive way, but this is a story as old as time, and your choices are the same as they have ever been.

You've been negotiating so you can either negotiate more firmly or find another job.

Certainly from everything you've said it does sound like this guy is happy to take advantage of you if you'll allow him to do so.

To put it more specifically it sounds like he's betting on your reluctance to find another job.

[-] [email protected] 1 points 2 days ago

Yeah, but if you read the Big Book of Business you will find that telling your employees that they are irreplacable and hold all the cards in a negotiation also gets a frowny face. If it was easy to replace them why did the boss cave to a one person strike the first time?

[-] [email protected] 30 points 3 days ago

let me guess, they tell everyone how they started a business by themselves and they work really hard as a independent entrepreneur. they hustle, they grind, they strive. they created a brand and watched it grow.

[-] [email protected] 30 points 3 days ago

yes. he loves to tell the story about how he worked tirelessly to come up with the formula for the brand and always says he “looked like a mad genius” scribbling his formula so many times to tweak it ☠️

[-] [email protected] 16 points 2 days ago

“Touch base” is one of those that really grinds my gears.

[-] [email protected] 6 points 2 days ago

hit me with that linkedin bullshit. i work in a fucking warehouse lmao i dont wanna hear that

[-] [email protected] 12 points 2 days ago

I remember that Lenin story about him sending university students to help farmers by shooting their kulaks. I wont see the end of capitalism in my lifetime but I can't imagine the jubilation of having true political power over these parasites.

[-] [email protected] 10 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

Rich snobs unironically give actual poor people this look in this day and age.

BRB moving to Italy and finding an oceanfront property in Naples and tell both the immigration agency and any landlord that I don't feel like paying a dime, but I should receive those things anyways because it would be nice of them to.

[-] [email protected] 10 points 3 days ago

Not even $20 an hour for a manufacturing job? Surely you can find something better than that.

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[-] [email protected] 25 points 3 days ago

Quit now and fuck up their vacation if you can. They're parasites.

[-] [email protected] 42 points 3 days ago

problem is if i quit i cant collect unemployment. my plan is to say ill accept 17/hr and step down from manufacturing since thats a big job and should be paying a lot more

if he says no to that then im going on strike when they’re on vacation and also joining all of the niche facebook groups where our customers come from and let them know how this “cruelty free” company views worker pay

[-] [email protected] 20 points 3 days ago

"Cruelty free" only applies to animals, silly. People aren't animals. They're just the objects I use to get my next $60,000 car and my second "vacation" since January for all the "hard work" I do.

From one animal to another: You already run their show. You see all those shipping manifests when you receive ingredients. Might be time to cut the fat and just run your own show.

[-] [email protected] 11 points 3 days ago

Just don't do your job while they're on vacation

[-] [email protected] 8 points 2 days ago

considering it. my fear is that i live in an at will employment state as it is, and in blompf’s america on top of that. im paranoid if i get fired the government is gonna suddenly decide the unemployed don’t need help (even the crumbs they’re getting now) and then im back out on the streets. i have a sibling which counts on me to collect a paycheck as well because we split bills so i dont want to risk putting them in a bad situation.

shit like this is how capitalism keeps workers oppressed. you’re not a free person. you live in a system that’s against you and you have to try and survive it which sadly means a lot of the time you cant do what you know you should (not work while your boss is on vacation)

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this post was submitted on 07 Jun 2025
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chapotraphouse

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