"Overworked and underpaid." "A revolving door of employees." "Stressful job for the pay."
If you're thinking about applying to Kroger, or you already work there and wonder whether it's like this everywhere, you're not alone in asking. Kroger is one of the largest employers in America, with upwards of 400,000 workers across its stores. And year after year, those workers describe a strikingly consistent experience.
We pulled together what employees, researchers, unions, courts, and news outlets have documented over the past decade. So what is it really like to work for Kroger?
The short version
This hugely profitable company’s front-line workers report low pay, insufficient hours, chronic understaffing, payroll problems, and workplace safety issues.
It's not that no one has a good experience; plenty of employees value their coworkers, the flexibility, or a union contract that protects them. But there are recurring themes that raise questions about Kroger’s values and commitment to its people.
1: The pay is low, and for many, it's not enough to live on
In 2022, the Economic Roundtable (with Occidental College) surveyed tens of thousands of Kroger workers across four states. What they found was staggering:
78% were food insecure, meaning these grocery store workers couldn't reliably afford to feed themselves.
14% were homeless or had been in the past year.
44% couldn't pay rent, and 36% worried about eviction.
What’s more, all survey respondents were union members, “indicating that the abysmal conditions reported may in fact be better than the conditions of the average U.S. grocery worker, given the fact that all of those surveyed have at least the minimal protections that union contracts provide.”
Workers say it plainly:
"7 and a half years in at Kroger and made just under $18 an hour as a Dept Head."
"Egregious pay, no sense of fulfillment or growth, management does not care."
"Low pay, and lack of hours. No room for growth into a sales floor position."
"No benefits until 1 year of employment. That's ridiculous."
Meanwhile, at the top, the math looks very different. In 2024, the typical Kroger worker's pay was $34,213, while then-CEO Rodney McMullen made $15.4 million - a CEO-to-worker pay ratio of 457 to 1.
2: Cut hours and "manipulative" scheduling
Even when the hourly rate isn't the worst part, the number of hours often is. Workers across the country describe hours cut to the point where the paycheck isn’t a living wage.
"Hours have been cut drastically”
"Schedule is a joke, starting out you get 20 hrs a week."
"I don't know a single cashier who has more than 26 hours a week."
"Hours were cut so bad we lost three day stockers on the same day."
Forbes reported that labor hours per Kroger store fell 14.1% from 2019 to 2023, even as prices and sales rose. Fewer hours spread across fewer people is a recipe for exactly what workers describe next.
3: Understaffing and doing "the job of two or three people"
A common refrain among Kroger employees is that chronic understaffing makes everything harder.
“You're expected to be both cashier and bagger now."
"Poor management, understaffed shifts, and inconsistent scheduling. The workload is often unrealistic…Stressful job for the pay."
"They understaff every department and will not hesitate to fire you for thin reasons."
"No OT [overtime incentives] but you're expected to do the work of 2-3 people."
"Trying to run pharmacy on a weekend with 1-2 techs and 1 pharmacist is always ROUGH."
The result is burnout, turnover, and unstable work culture - what workers called a "revolving door" of personnel.
4: Paycheck problems - a $20.8 million payroll settlement
In September 2022, Kroger rolled out a new payroll system called MyTime/MyInfo with catastrophic consequences. Thousands of employees reported paychecks that were late, incorrect, or missing altogether.
The fallout was enormous:
At least four class-action lawsuits.
A $20.8 million settlement covering roughly 47,000 employees who worked between September 2022 and May 2023.
One union reported more than 1,000 worker complaints.
Kroger has faced more than 20 wage-related lawsuits since 2020.
5: Safety issues
Working in a grocery store can be more dangerous than people assume, and Kroger's OSHA record describes serious incidents, including forklift fines, extreme temperature exposure, meat department machine hazards, a band-saw citation that resulted in a traumatic finger injury, and a fatal scaffolding inspection failure.
And many workers say safety concerns get ignored. The theme that comes through again and again: the company only makes improvements when shamed or pressured, not when workers ask.
6: The "hero pay" publicity stunt
Early in the Covid pandemic, Kroger paid front-line workers an extra $2/hour in "hero pay" and publicly praised them as “essential.” Just months later, in May 2020, it ended “hero pay” while profits kept climbing and then-CEO Rodney McMullen was paid over $22 million, almost 900x more than a typical Kroger employee. The union called it "an insult," and, for a lot of workers, the message was clear: the praise was nothing more than a publicity stunt.
The role of unions
Here's something important for anyone weighing a job at Kroger: United Food and Commercial Workers International Union (UFCW) represents workers in 2/3 of all Kroger stores nationwide, but not all Kroger stores have union representation. Whether your store is union or not changes a lot.
Union divisions like King Soopers (Colorado), Ralphs (Southern California), and Fred Meyer/QFC (Pacific Northwest) have negotiated wage scales, step raises, protected pensions, and grievance rights. Non-union Kroger stores lack the organized infrastructure and contractual protections a union provides around striking.
And union workers on average actually earn higher wages and receive better benefits than non-union employees. UFCW reports that “a worker covered by a union contract earns 12.8 percent more in wages than a peer with similar education, occupation, and experience in a non-unionized workplace in the same industry.” While union membership doesn’t erase all the hardships posed by Kroger’s policies, a contract gives workers ground to stand on and a way to fight back that non-union employees don't always have.
So, what is it really like to work for Kroger?
If you take the company's marketing at face value, “here, people matter.” But if you listen to the people who actually do the work, far too many describe inadequate pay and hours, unmanageable workloads, and a feeling of being treated as disposable. As the worker strikes, OSHA violations, and lawsuits make headlines, the company posts record profits and pays its CEO hundreds of times more than the typical worker.
Workers deserve better. And the first step is making sure their experiences are heard.
Tell Us Your Kroger Story
Do you work, or did you work, at Kroger or one of the stores owned by the company (Ralphs, King Soopers, Fred Meyer, Harris Teeter, Mariano's, Fry's, Smith's, Dillons, QFC, and others)? Share your experience at KrogerHurtsFamilies.com. You can tell your story with your name or remain anonymous.
Sources
Economic Roundtable, Hungry at the Table (Jan. 11, 2022) — survey of 36,000+ Kroger workers; coverage in In These Times, Newsweek, Jacobin
HuffPost - New Kroger Payroll System Has Led To Wage Theft, Workers Allege (Jan 2023)
WCPO I-Team — Kroger facing four class-action lawsuits over payroll mistakes (Jan 2023)
ClassAction.org, $20.8 Million Kroger Settlement Reached to Resolve Unpaid Wage Lawsuit (Dec 2024)
OB Rag, ‘Stand With Grocery Workers Who Are Overworked, Understaffed and Underpaid’ (Feb 2025)
OSHA/U.S. Dept. of Labor releases — forklift fine, band-saw citation, extreme temperature exposure, fatal scaffolding inspection failure, meat dept machine hazards
Colorado Sun, CPR, Washington Post (2022 King Soopers strike); Grocery Dive, Colorado Newsline (2025 strike)
Forbes, How Underinvestment Is Starving Grocery Stores And Feeding Wall Street (2025)
Employee reviews quoted verbatim from Kroger's Indeed reviews page and the Kroger Employee Forum
Disclaimer: The quotes in this article are drawn from public, anonymous employee reviews and forum posts and reflect the personal experiences and recollections of the individuals who wrote them. They are reproduced as written, including original spelling.
