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My dm informed me that 363 studios are being closed nation wide. I am not sure what brands, but from what I am seeing it's mostly PM. Last shoot day is Saturday, closed Easter day then packing up next week. Believed last in studio day is April 6th. An email will be sent out tomorrow but the dms were told early to tell the stores so all the mess and anger from last time doesn't happen again.
Unemployment is a certain amount of money to be claimed with in a year. After that amount is reached in a year, you can file for emergency unemployment 3 times afterwards, but still all in a year. After the year, I think you may refile but I am not sure.
Wow 95%!!!!! Stateside is 56% told sales and 70% of sits! I don't think I have, or many other studios, brought in over a 1000 in a week since Christmas.
Any more info on this? Has anyone else heard anything?
My bet is with the end of the period this Sunday, they will see the "trend" from Christmas was not a trend, just standard Christmas seasons numbers, be it very low numbers, it pull the plug next week. Especially if thebuyer backed out, if there ever was one....
I completely agree with that and have thought tattoo. A way of falsifying documents with out actually doing anything illegal, genius move, horrible outcome tho lol
The thin with using Walmart one hour photo, is that Walmart (when I worked there, not sure if things have changed) has contracts with Fuji, now mostly hp, to use their machines. And the way the contracts worked was that the photo associations were actually Fuji/hp employees and the equipment was all rented to Walmart.. So if we were to do that, we would need to also strike new contracts and deals with Fuji/hp to use thier equipment and employees. It's just not as easy as walking back with the memory card and printing stuff.
Your right, I forgot it was a holiday today.also, adp is not just a computer program, they are an accountant third party company we use, but they are given the info from CPI, and my check says pay ending 2-16 so yes I am short two days, the two days after the eac issue, as is many other managers in my area.
My check is posted as well, it is roughly 20 hours short, seemingly the amount of hours for friday and saturday after the "glitch" in the eac. i also have not earned/received pto hours on my check, but when i look in the eac, it has it that i have earned 75 hours and used 25 already!! wtf this company is going down so bad. how can studios perform any daily functions without phone and internet. they cant. they are setting up for failure everyday we turn on the lights, going to attempt a call to hr today, but i am sure they will be flooded, if anyone is even there. going to also call unemployment to see if me not showing up to work because of not getting paid will affect my unemployment lol
OHHH best part, my "dm" sent me an application this morning!!!! sure, lets hire some one and then tell them they probably wont get paid lol oh and i don't have hours to train them either!
The best was the free VIP offers. I would get customers asking me to take their name and number to call them for the next offer! even had family members coming in to see if we had it going on cuz the sister or someone got a free picture and they want the free picture. I have a huge clientele now, and they are all freebies!!
Yes I did read that. In December of 2012, clearlake did buy thq, however in January, the court overturned that and did not allow them to buy them because clearlake tried to buy them primary before thq even announce they were for sale. The court then ordered thq to be forced into an auction at the end of january because they were more valuable in pieces than in a whole.
The best breakdown I found is
http://venturebeat.com/2013/01/23/thq-auction/
And the best article I found
http://xbox.about.com/od/news/a/Thq-Forced-To-Auction-Assets.htm
That is true about thq, but what I read is Clearlakewas ready to aquire them but when it went to auction, the individual sales added up to more than what they wanted to pay (which was 60 million) so clearlake did not get them in the end.
This does still cause worry, they will orally try to buy CPI as they did with thq, at auction, and try for one big group at a set price, so if at auction, 10 companies want to but portions of CPI and end up paying more than clearlake is willing, our futures would be the same.
I hand found the same. They seem to buy training companies, restructured them and then sell for profit. Essentially they flip companies, tho I cannot find any new news on the companies they have bought. I have not received, or anyone else in my district, this email. Please keep us posted.
If there are buyers looking sole at assets, then I would think they would wait for a chapter 7 and buy it at auction for possible half the price.
Agreed, chapter 11 could not work with our debt to asset ratio. However (if I'm understanding everything and it's legal) if we do file chapter 11, becauss of the ratio, the lenders would take control of the company, then could the lenders sell off the company to the new buyer? Not sure if that scenario is legal tho.
there has been a great divide between the studio managers and the district/regional managers. Not many sm feel they can trust the dm/rm teams anymore, quite sad. I honestly feel the same, my dm does not have my back at all and it seems that has swept the board completly...quite sad
Sec just filed, if I'm reading it right, company now has till Feb 15th to pay back the new amount of 97.4 million. At the 15th, bank can exercise all rights yo get money......looks like it's curtaun call soon....
They did say that, but I just counted all of them on the ytd scorecard and there are 7 rd (2 of which are the east and west coast directors) and 39 dms, and from I heard the additional ten dms that were brought back are demoted rds...still a huge chunk on forloughed...
That has been company policy for forever. During the bad flooding two years ago, I almost had to buy a sleeping bag to sleep in my studio lol. It is up yo the dm and the host store if you can close early. I only did once, and it was an hour early, didn't do to much for the road quality lol
When I got hired the first time for seasonal.at Sears I said thanks, two years later quite cuz I was being screwed over by my managers.and really did not like the direction of the company . Then two years later I got re-hired at picture me I said thanks to the manager whom hired me,not cpi, and said I hope things changed with the company, she chuckled. Nothing changed, only got worse. Now whether I quite or get fired, which ever happens first, I will only be saying thanks cuz I get out of here. Fieldm sacrificed a lot and only got screwed over in the end. We all sacrifice so much only to be asked more and more. At no other job I worked at, if I said I needed off for my kids ________ (you fill in the blank) would I be told tough you gotta work, even if coverage was OK. I have been fortunately to have had a great team to work with to help me get most my time off, but I know so many that have not been so lucky.People have missed birthday and funerals. Should they say thank?
You do not know hoe this company treated it's employees. Don't act like you do.
My call just reported the same stuff this forum is saying, two letters of intent, need $60 prs, lab is back to full and rds really all back blah blah blah.....
She may have even gotten her info from here! Lol
All I can say is
I'll believe it when I see it!
Our names started appearing on emails early last year, when we were still doing own your customer calls. They wanted your info prolly for a roster. And some managers middle initial appears too!!
I often walk around thinking about everything that has been happening. When I came back to the company after a 2 year break and go the picme division (was at Sears first) I had hoped for a change. Turned out nothing really changed, sadly only got worse with the marketing. The only thing that kept me was the fact I do live the job, my coworkers were amazing, and my dm actually did her job. She didn't just threaten or yell or ask for more. She pushed and worked with me. Even when I starting getting really bad sales and running lower than my normal sales, she fought for me and tried to help me get out of my slump, she didn't just threaten. She was the best dm I ever had with the company, and I had 5 in 4 years (I had her as dm for 2 of those years). Wish you best of luck.
Actually yes I did hear Sears associates saying that. When we consolidated I heard lots saying it. But look at the numbers it looks other wise, I think. In the end tho, it doesn't matter what brand did what, or what brand got favored more, it's simply what studio did what...
There is a fraud hotline, it's in your communications binder. the open door policy did work back in the day, now with so few rds not sure how it would work, best bet would maybe try a diffedent rd than your imediate one. Just out of curiosity, if she is having you reenter the sales in sas, how are you ringing the money in register/fd200?
Couple of things with that. Walmart prints are pictures taken by Joe shmo and they need only pay the assoc at the counter, there is nothing professional with that. Sears, pictureme, kiddie kandids are portraits taken by trained photographers, when we print, you pay the photographer, ups, lab technicians, and so on. Thus our price is higher. Have you gone to a private photographer before? They charge 2 to 3 times as much as us.
You cannot compare studio portraits to one hour photography, unless you often compare bananas to suvs.
This doesn't really mean anything but I just found a bit comical, the last time any cpi executive or officer bought shares of cpi was Oct of 2011, in 2012 there was only selling done by them, wonder if any of them even owns stock still, and if there is any big plan for saving the company, would they not be buying now at such a low rate so they could make big bucks?
Again prolly means nothing, I know little about stock market (barely passed that part of high school lol).
"If the business' debts exceed its assets, the bankruptcy restructuring results in the company's owners being left with nothing; instead, the owners' rights and interests are ended and the company's creditors are left with ownership of the newly reorganized company"
That is from the chapter 11 codes. And I would venture a guess that our assets do not match the 96.3 million that we owe so the banks would own us. But a chapter 11 is a preplanned thing between debtee and creditee so one is left to wonder what plan Jim and the banks have worked out...
Of course, my Conference said nothing at all. Just asked for more sales....hope someone else's call is more informative...
My dm was just fired, a few days ago she was told my our rm that she would be back soon.....
I think, regardless of how negative anyone on here sounds, we are all working hard to provide the best customer service that we can. We all love our jobs and would love nothing more than for this all to end tomorrow and be told of some financial miracle to happen so that that we can keep doing what we love to do. However, like it has been said, the studio managers and associates have become family with our customers, would you tell your sister lie after lie after lie to save face? We are just venting here so that we can remain calm in the studio and do our job the bet we can. No matter what happens, us employees will continue to give the best customer service to our families. We just want to know what is going on....end of story.
Rest assure investors, it is not us employees screwing you over, it's our board and president and anyone else that ia bringing in 6 digit incomes at home office.
The story may or not be made up, but the remaining dms and rds are not, in my opinion, the "selected ones". from what I know the remaining ones are the cheapest ones, all the dms in my area that have been here for years and were amazing at the jobs were put out by newbie ones whom have yet to prove a name for themselves...
cant wait for the sec to update, need to know what is going on, im going ocd over checking their site and this site and a few others i keep up on...
A fellow sps manager checked hers and she logged in fine with cpicorp id. like I said I am no adp expert, just using what I know and best logical guesses lol
If you are logging in with lifetouch id, I would assume you would only see lifetouch paystubs, I am no adp expert, but I would think cpi and lifetouch would be different accounts and not linked together at all, and if you are seeing both company paystubs, then there is a link. (Only reason I say that is because my wife cannot view her paystubs via adp because her company does not offer online stubs from adp, just adp paper stubs, but her previous job offered online and they are not linked at all...)
That doesn't make sense, if you used your cpi one before, it should still work,as well as your lifetouch one so that you could retrieve w2s and what not....have going ever used your cpi one before?
My Call is nothing at all. Just went over the op page. Hopefully you get something on all of yours!
I have not heard about a special one tomorrow. But my new dm tells us absolutly nothing so im not suprised...
Is this a special Conf Call? We Also have one Friday morning...just curious
Uh make it brother lol.
Agree! I think they should/need a company wide conference Call tomorrow to tell us managers what is going on and what to expect. Tomorrow is the deadline for the banks and nothing has been filed yet, regardless of anything being filed though, they need to be blunt and straight forward with us. I know they won't let us in on any plans but it would be nice for a change....
If you look, the stock has made several high amount jumps, III blue to drop down within the hour or so so I wouldn't base much on that.
Has there been any verification of the extension yet? I haven't seen any new sec filings....