As the Ghislaine Maxwell trial started today and the UK media remains silent after I sent the below to the press, and Maxwell’s camp tried hard to keep evidence out of court, I re-post this again and again!
UPDATE August 2022
My brief “case study” on Julian Metcalfe, it’s not indepth as I want to highlight something specific: Julian Metcalfe’s Family Line.
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So here I am, minding my own business when I receive an email from an anonymous person with a link to page 38 for a “black book” of none other then convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein, who some believe may have been “suicided”. As I am contacted by former and current Pret staff, as well as now itsu issues that I pass on to the press, and at times it gets reported on, I get info as my blog is the main link between behind the scenes of Pret/itsu and the public/press.
So, the black address book of Epstein, what names do I see?
Pret A Manger co-“re”-founder and itsu founder, net-worth £215 million, Julian Metcalfe and his former wife Melanie with two addresses and phone numbers.
Of course it’s not a crime to be in a convicted pedophile & sex trafficker’s address book. And to be fair, Metcalfe was married to Melanie between 1992 and 2005. The first allegation on Epstein to police came in 2005, so technically people didn’t/couldn’t know about Epstein’s crimes. But still! Itsu staff have reviewed Metcalfe as sexist, racist, aggressive etc. (see YouTube below). Metcalfe comes from a long line of elite British folk and grew up wealthy and privileged. And in an interview with the Telegraph in July 2021 Metcalfe’s words are headlined with “Only the fittest will survive high street cull”.
This is very much in line with Metcalfe’s words to the Daily Mail last year regarding lock-down and being happy to sacrifice a few thousand very old and vulnerable people for the hospitality industry (again, please see YouTube below).
So, only Metcalfe knows why he is in Epstein’s infamous “black book” that has Ghislane Maxwell shake in her boots! And it doesn’t need to mean anything. But I find it noteworthy to mention after Metcalfe’s own aggressive words to the press (and other words that he deleted after I confronted him on Twitter), and what others say about him.
Quote from the Western Journal: »Epstein employee Alfredo Rodriguez called the list the “Holy Grail” or “Golden Nugget” that would map out the billionaire’s alleged underage sex network. Rodriguez first tried to sell it to journalists; instead, authorities seized it as evidence.«
I was sent this because I chased Metcalfe off Twitter last year and put it on a YouTube slide where I explained why Pret can’t be distanced to Metcalfe, after Pret made a statement of distancing themselves when Metcalfe made his appalling “eugenicist” lock-down comments to none other than the Daily Mail tabloid of all papers! Dumb move! After I chased him off Twitter, he’s become a little more media savvy now!
On his 2 day Twitter stint, I posted itsu staff reviews to Metcalfe where he is alleged to be sexist, racist, aggressive etc. Metcalfe continued his dumbness by RT’ing my Tweets to him! I suppose someone from Pret then must have warned him of who I am, as he then deleted his Twitter account the next day after only 2 days there, not knowing I already made screenshots!
I even tweeted at him saying, “will see how long you can hold on Twitter”, never thinking he lasted only 2 days, as other Pret execs ran off Twitter since I exposed Pret there.
His deletedTweets:
I use YouTube as my blog url is blocked completely on Facebook/Instagram even in private messages! But they can’t block YouTube!
Please note, I changed my Twitter handle “LateNightGirlMe to @expretDOTorg, as “late night girl” doesn’t make any sense for new readers. I explain how I came to my former handle in below audio player interview.
Most of his deleted Tweets where he retweeted my Tweets here on YouTibe:
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Little side note: Former Pret CEO Clive Schlee is very close friends and business partner with Julian Metcalfe. And Schlee is on the board of directors and owns half of itsu. But no, Schlee isn’t in Epstein’s address book, I’ve already checked! 😉
And a little piece about one of the phone books, as there is more than 1 it seems:
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I worked at Pret A Manger and survived systemic workplace bullying during bereavement that involved HR, the top leadership, HQ and even the now “retired” former CEO Clive Schlee (a close friend & business partner of Julian Metcalfe who also owns half of Metcalfe’s company itsu). I declined 4 settlement offers if I am silent about my ordeal. But I rather speak out to help others. For an overview of important blog entries of my experience with Pret, please visit “My Ordeal with Pret A Manger”. The little arrow to the right next to each heading will lead directly to the post. An incomplete list on what other Pret staff say about Pret’s bullying environment: Caught in the Act Bullying at Pret. I tell my story for the first time verbally in below audio player interview on a podcast by The Adam Paradox, and wrote two articles in the Scottish Left Review.
This link My Pret A Manger Ordeal is a simple and easier overview to link straight to some of the most important blog entries, summarizing my trauma with Pret A Manger. There is much more writing on my website / blog, but the links on the map are the main articles to narrow down, pointing to the main issues of my trauma with Pret.
On the “map”:
click on the – minus bottom right to decrease and get an overview of the whole map
click on the dots to expand or close menu.
click on the -> arrow on a particular title to link straight to the article
hold the mouse clicked, “grabbing” it to move map around as you would with Google map
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I worked at Pret A Manger and survived systemic workplace bullying during bereavement that involved HR, the top leadership, HQ and even the now “retired” former CEO Clive Schlee. I declined 4 settlement offers if I am silent about my ordeal. But I rather speak out to help others. For an overview of important blog entries of my experience with Pret, please visit “My Ordeal with Pret A Manger”. The little arrow to the right next to each heading will lead directly to the post. An incomplete list on what other Pret staff say about Pret’s bullying environment: Caught in the Act Bullying at Pret. I tell my story for the first time verbally in below audio player interview on a podcast by The Adam Paradox, and wrote two articles in the Scottish Left Review.
This is the REALITY of Pret A Manger behind the facade WORLDWIDE. The clean facade of freebies, the forced smiles (tested by Mystery Shoppers), the “ethical” front of Pret that got away with 2 customer deaths, a third allergy reaction nearly fatal (new court-case in November 2020), several injured, multiple warnings ignored etc. Seeking independent investigation into a staff suicide.
UPDATE:LAWSUIT filed against Pret in NYC for racism and discrimination (bottom of page).
Link (More reviews further below in this blog post)
A rare complaint from Hong Kong where most people put their heads down and continue under hard conditions:
Link to Tweet. An online conversion from HKD 45 to British Pound is roughly £4.65 an hour! And Pret didn’t even respond to the Tweet.
UPDATE: August 2021:
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A VERY common bullying incident from a Manager towards a Team Member. But this time it didn’t happen behind the facade in the kitchen, office or staff room, hidden away from customers, this time it happened in front of customers. The “ethical profile” of Pret is a facade the public still believes, because the bullying is usually happening behind the scenes, away from customers’ eyes. And then, when the Manager or Leader has finished bullying the staff member, the intimidated and humiliated Team Member then is send out to the shop floor, and expected to smile for Mystery Shopper bonus and fool customers with a fake happiness. And as many are from other countries, young, have children to feed or Uni tuition to pay, they feel stuck, too exhausted to find a new job and not knowing where to turn to.
And when the bullying is happening on the shop floor, shops are so noisy with loud music, shouting of staff to make and get coffee orders, talking, busyness. Customers are occupied on their phones or laptops, distracted with talking, eating etc. So, when it happens in the shop, people don’t even notice.
Even when I was bullied during bereavement under the watchful eye of HR, I NEVER told a customer or colleague. I was complimented by customers and received rewards from Mystery Shoppers for my service, smile, giving freebies etc. And after my shift at times I headed for the bridge and still don’t know how I survived. But none of my colleagues and customers knew my inner state and turmoil. I explain in detail at the very bottom YouTube slide about what weekly Mystery Shoppers test staff on, or via this link: “Smile for the Misery Shopper“.
This creates a host of mental health issues under Emotional Labour, that staff are forced to perform. What @Katecordon witnessed here and confronted Pret in below Tweet, is so familiar to me, and this would be a situation where I as a Team Leader then had to console the Team Member crying in the staff room and at times speak to the Manager. Only ONE time when I spoke to the Manager why they shouted at the TM, this Manager apologized to the TM. But this was only one Manager out of many who did not apologize and rather bullied me then as well for speaking out. But I didn’t care!
The Team Member in below customer Tweet made a very simple, innocent, normal mistake. No big deal. And by the way, the TM made that mistake because she was most likely NOT trained in the first place! The Manager must have stood nearby witnessing this mistake. To correct the mistake the TM then did give the 10% discount, but explained at the same time that she made a mistake and gave the 10% as a one-off. PERFECT customer service!!! In fact, a Mystery Shopper would have probably given the TM an “outstanding card”, meaning the extra £100 reward, or even £200 if the overall scores were perfect. Mystery Shoppers many times gave the reward, even when a mistake happened, but they rewarded the staff member due to how they handled the mistake.
The same is by law, when a price tag gives an old cheaper price even though the price has increased, the business is obligated to charge that old cheaper price, even if the till system is updated with the new expensive price. But this TM probably doesn’t know the law on this and did instinctively the right thing because she cares! The TM here did a perfect, correct and kind customer service, but was bullied by the Manager for making a simple mistake and then giving the 10% discount as a good will gesture, which is commendable! And this Manager is particularly offensive by talking down on the customer as well: “It’s company policy, love“. Very, very, very, very common bullying incident in Pret! Bullying and fear management by the book.
The reason this Manager makes a huge issue out of the 10% discount wrongly given as a student discount, is that Pret only does regular discounts in some places like malls or train stations (but not all malls or stations), where the other companies and train station staff within that station or mall get a 10% discount showing their staff badge. So, this Manager would have to do half a minute of paper work to explain for the financial file why the 10% was given in this Manchester airport, that doesn’t give student discounts. Managers hate to do little paper work issues like this as they want their financial records to look perfect. I got in trouble many times for doing it the proper way in recording mistakes, because Managers didn’t like mistakes in their financial files and rather stress staff to not make these mistakes. And at one time I’ve had enough and told one Manager that if a financial file is perfect without any mistakes, this would ring alarm bells with me if I was a financial auditor. But that’s another story. And honest mistakes that are effectively recorded can be traced back in the system and explained. Again, no big deal.
And also by the way, this Manager most likely continued the bullying later in the office, as bullying Pret managers and leaders can’t let go and continue later on, especially when caught out by customers and they “lost face” in front of the TM they just bullied. So, they try to “establish” authority and continue behind closed doors. I hope that young lady finds quick support! And if this Manager is disciplined by Pret, then only because he got caught by a customer who called him out publicly, like he did with his Team Member. If the TM alone would have complained to HR, nothing would have happened.
This shows as well in the very first review from the new LAX Pret shop that was opened in the summer 2019. I could not have put it into better words how this bullying environment thrives in Pret worldwide. I love American reviews, because they find amazing words!:
A little reality check and crash course of Pret’s “ethical” profile. What staff dare to say in anonymity, away from the fear management. Clive Schlee “retired” with quite a legacy!
Glassdoor scores on Pret and its leadership. I wrote a new blog post as well on >>> Pret’s new CEO Pano Christou, and Clive Schlee remaining in the background as a non-executive Director, while on his Twitter account he still presents himself as the CEO of Pret! (UPDATE: July 2020, Schlee’s Twitter account has also been deleted in July 2020). I explain in above blog why Pano Christou deleted his Twitter account. Clive Schlee let Pano Christou take over on Glassdoor already in July 2019, even though Schlee’s retirement was set for September 2019. This typical passing the buck downwards is to avoid further negative scoring. And yet, still not taking responsibility.
NOTE: Pret settled TWO lawsuits in NY having had to pay 4000 workers back after illegally having “shaved off” (rounded down) their pay. But in the UK no-one goes to court, even though the same problem of unpaid hours is systemic throughout the company, as I have experienced countless times myself. One review below shows the hopelessness on the feeling that staff can’t do anything about this.
And only after getting caught and a public outcry and boycotts for not wanting to pay 500 (!) young summer recruits. Do the math on how much money that is. And getting young folk in, who don’t know their rights and are brainwashed easier. Pret always tries and changes direction when caught and boycotted.
Link to FULL review WORTH READING! One quote from above review on the hopelessness, compared to U.S. staff who filed class-action suit against Pret twice: “Sometimes it can be challenging maintaining a natural smile on my face for 8 hours straight. … Pret will do anything not to pay you. They will bend the law and the contract in any way they can,and there is nothing you can do about it (unless smile).”
Because the legal system is different here…no pro-bono lawyer likes to take this on as I’ve experienced, because when you win, the payout is so low, lawyers don’t want to pick this up for their 33% peanuts from a low reward in the UK legal system. Too much work for little reward.
Several reviews on Pret’s shiny London Head Office from current and former employees at the time of reviewing on Indeed and Glassdoor. Again, these are reviews on Pret’s HEAD OFFICE in Victoria, London where the CEO and other Senior Leadership also have their desks in the open plan offices where I saw them many times working on laptops etc.
Also, some reviews from office / corporates in New York.
Link“People don’t seem to get promoted unless you are a bully or belittle your team members. The place is toxic.“
Another one from January 2019
Link“… working really really long hours. No work life balance whatsoever”.
2017 review on HQ from an IT Analyst on Glassdoor:
Link“Manipulative and exploitative approach to employees as owners and senior management concerned about profit margin only. People are taken into account only if it makes a good PR. Genuinely fake and dishonest company.”
UPDATE 05. January 2020 NEW HQ review(customer service team) on homophobia, manipulative HR dealings etc.
Link“Pret has brought over many managers and leaders from the UK and ‘beheaded’ many of the US employees who built the brand…”
This is really upsetting, because I remember when I asked my managers over the years where such-an-such an OPs Manager or General Manager is, I often heard that they where sent to New York, as the American Managers can’t handle the work / can’t manage properly. I remember being confused about this, because I lived in Florida for almost 6 years and traveled to different cities over the years, visiting friends. I stayed 3 months on the West Coast, visited North Dakota, the East Coast, the deep South, often for several months. I have many American friends. Americans are one of THE hardest working people. They are inventive, passionate, disciplined, fun, helpful etc. I was confused, but then thought that I know how complex and micromanaging Pret is, so I didn’t think any more of it. But now I realize, reading all the American reviews that what I was told was bullcrap!
Reading the above review and all the other reviews from the U.S., the main thing the American reviews have in common is: favoritism and racism. And it’s really upsetting, because I know the American mentality vs. the British.
UPDATE: Feb. 2020 from Washington DC – Fired due to pregnancy!
Probational period is 3 months, so they quickly fired her and she can’t take it up in court.
Link I can verify that. I worked in over a dozen Pret shops over the years, and EVERY manager seems to take it personal when you move on. I only moved shop due to management. The reason was always management. They don’t look at you anymore, seem offended when you move on, and yet, they can’t give you a positive word while you work there and then wonder why you leave! And the language barrier is big. You do feel left out very quick when the majority are from a certain country, and you work with them for 8+ hours without understanding a word all day. You feel left out, not understanding their language. And this is not meant racist at all. It’s just a courtesy and inclusiveness to speak English.
Bullying from the top down: A review by a Team Leader who runs the kitchen and the shop! OPs (area manager) bullying the manager who cries in the office. This OPs sounds particularly nasty, and reminds me of an OPs that I had before my brother died and I was still strong holding out under this kind of “leadership”! It’s also a recent review from 03. October 2019 (this is Chicago, but this happens in other countries/cities as well):
Link“My typical work day consist of Ops Manager yelling and cursing at my manager. … Managers cry in their offices because of how stressed they are. … Managers are secretly looking for new jobs right now to get out of Pret.“
Link“This job should be reported to the department of labor”. Pret settled 2 lawsuits in New York, re-paying 4000 workers. In the UK hardly anyone sues because the legal system is different, low rewards that no lawyer wants to pick up. In the U.S. one reviewer on Indeed recently wrote that Pret is always getting sued.
Link“This company is everything that is wrong with the world. … Corporate hell on earth.”
Former General Manager 4 years after Bridgepoint purchased Pret:
Link Review from NY 2011, but this is throughout the company and still today, quote: “Management is very incompetent. It is clear they have little to know training and have absolutely no training or experience in employee relations or even customer relations for that matter. Every manager I have worked with – I have worked with 6 – will immediately try to belittle you. Not sure exactly why this is such a common practice among managers but it is an intrinsic behavior within the company itself. … Even though Pret A Manger emphasizes that they are a “people first” type of company, the reality of it is is that they are solely concerned with sales and view their employees as faceless and a dime a dozen. You’re not God. Take a continuing ed course in management, employee relations, and labor rights. This should be a requirement before even obtaining the position.“
I can only underline above (and ALL) reviews, and yet know that Pret does NOT care about labour rights etc.
Link“A lot of people cry in the staff room especially in their entry period”
23. Oct. 2019 “I have work in different shops and they are all very similar, it is a toxic environment, Never in my life I have seen so many different coworkers cry in the job. Give more training to your managers, and hire better people, don’t allow them to abuse the staff, it is appalling.”
The next review from recently is a very typical scenario of abusive fear-management by Managers. Scaring low-wage workers that they’re “playing with lives” while the top Senior Leadership got away with TWO customer deaths, Clive Schlee sneaking out quietly, remaining in the background as a non-executive Director, while having ignored customer warnings (link to article), not acting until the deaths became public:
»This job can annihilate every piece of humanity inside of you.
You will lose everything that makes you human.«
Link“I spend 6 months racing all day and barely spoke 3-5 words a day on my shifts if I’m not on till where you are required to have the widest fake smile on earth…”
UPDATE:31.10.2019
A brand new review by a current General Manager that absolutely breaks my heart! One of many along the lines of no work-life balance, due to under-staffed shops and not paid for overtime.
Link“I am about to lose my family as I am never there. I leave to work at 4 am and get home 7 at night. My children looking at me like a I am a stranger. It’s not a life. … Bullying, long hours, shortage of staff, – it’s a proper Modern day slavery”
I think this is the most heart-breaking review I’ve ever seen by any staff member, let alone a Manager. I hope they find a way! I actually cried when I read this.
Another recent Manager review from Chicago tells a similar story, quote: “With the wrong management, the shops begin to break down and brings inner conflict. Pay could be better, especially for seasoned employees. Management gets overworked to save on labor costs. Don’t expect to see much of home as a manager.” Link
Another GM from London in August 2019:
Link A little side note, GMs go to quarterly meetings where the CEO and top leadership are present as well, so GMs know Senior Leaders more than the regular staff. Some GMs disapprove of the CEO – at the time it still was Clive Schlee. But I find it interesting that this GM has NO opinion of the CEO, as if this GM doesn’t care to even mention their like/dislike.
And another GM on Indeed from Glasgow, Scotland: “Amazing in the beginning – showered with benefits and entitlements and opportunities to advance. Terrible once you see how horribly mismanaged and micromanaged the company is. Zero care for human beings and nothing but boosting sales and company growth.“
A little reminder again that Clive Schlee pocketed £30 Million on bonus alone when JAB Holdings bought Pret!Link to article.
UPDATE: 10. November 2019 Brand new Manager review on Indeed worth reading!
Link Quote: “Managers are forced to cheat on results and break standards just so that the area manager looks good on paper, though he stays at home most of the days whilst the shops collapse.“ Yes, but this has always been like this. OPs Managers sit in the pub at lunch time when shops are horrendously busy. OPs Managers fly out to Dubai, Paris or in the U.S. to Vegas, Orlando etc. as mentioned above, to party and blow the hard earned money the shops bring in. Many times I didn’t see my OPs Manager for at least THREE MONTHS at a time, and when they came in, they bossed us around and played scary fear management for a few minutes, before disappearing again for months! The only thing I saw regularly was EMAILS and pressuring us on numbers and Mystery Shopper results!
Quote: “Since 2018 there is so much pressure in getting the standards right however I’ve seen kitchens running on two people on night shifts and even one on day shift (where four people are required per shift) as area management does want figures to be right on paper- this could cause enormous issues if something went wrong i.e. allergens.”
Quote: “People are over stretched and tired since the pressure to achieve selection in stores is high but not enough labour in.“
Quote: “We as managers aim to make our teams happy and safe however the over stretching on labour just made us cover the gaps over and over not realising the biggest gap was within us unable to have a normal life or humanity due to the amount of hours being psychologically forced into work.”
Quote: “I have met great people and higher management in this company but there is an unacceptable level of fear cultureup here in Edinburgh, where people believe they won’t actually be okay if they quit their job if unhappy. It’s 2019 and if your employer raises you to be scared to develop elsewhere then it’s not a good employer.”
Nothing more to add!
And the gift that keeps on giving, a NEW MANAGER review on Glassdoor 16. Nov. 2019
Link“Those willing to step on others make it to the top. Talk the talk but actually don’t live by the values they preach.”
This review is one of my absolute favourites, and brings some humour into all this!
Also, pay attention to the YES vs NO votes on all these reviews.
I could go on and on and on, and add countless more along those lines of above reviews, but my posts tend to get too long. I just post one more which is the shortest review I have come across. It doesn’t take many words to describe Pret A Manger. This is even from a Team Leader. Well, it’s simply Pret:
Above comments and articles are only a fraction of a long list of staff reviews and complaints. For an extensive, yet not exhaustive list please visit: Pret Staff Complaints (list needs to be updated, I stopped in August 2019) with a few collected in below slideshow.
Finally, some very wise words I came across once on Twitter, but I know Pret will not heed (they read my blog) because they are stuck in this profit-driven business and always find ways to sweet-talk their way out of responsibility:
»It’s amazing to me how many business leaders separate their employees from their customers/patrons. Your employees are your core target audience to put word-of-mouth out about your organization.« — @minmilyjung on Twitter
Any employee reading this, especially in Pret and the service industry:
Join a Union and leave reviews on Glassdoor, Indeed and other platforms.
The following Unions cover the food industry:
The BFAWU are the best informed about Pret and have helped Pret staff already. The BFAWU have been instrumental on the first ever McDonald’s strikes in the UK. Also another vital and very active Union that specialize in helping foreign workers is IWGB.
The BFAWU and IWGB are very active with McDonald’s strikes and are the best informed about Pret A Manger.
May not work on mobile devices without Wifi.
Slideshow can be paused
The above slideshow is just a selection, the list goes on in → Pret Staff Complaints. And extensive accounts of Pret’s systemic bullying behind the facade, also witnessed by customers: Caught in the Act at Pret.
Staff review: “Bad managemet, always being ‘hounded’.”
Staff review: “Worked into the ground without empathy.”
Smile for the Mystery Shopper. I renamed: “Misery Shopper”!
NOTE:When on Glassdoor, one has to register and be signed in to read reviews. Glassdoor has changed its selection of reviews. On Pret A Manger reviews, Glassdoor is now sieving out Managers and Leaders reviews on the front page. To see ALL the recent reviews on Glassdoor, click where it says “Popular” and select “Most recent” or “Lowest Rating” AND Clear All “Full-time, Part-time”. Also, Glassdoor demands logins now, where you can only see ONE review without being registered and logged in. The reason why the amount of reviews change from 683 to 697 may be that Glassdoor withholds some reviews. But I’m not sure how that works. On Indeed at the Location feature, scroll up to select “All” and it will automatically list all cities/countries in chronological order starting with the newest.
Indeed now even started handpicking reviews as “the most useful review selected by Indeed”, which shows that these review sites are not neutral, as they only select the positive ones, no matter how “rotten” the company may be or how many experienced staff have voted their agreement with the (negative) review:
DEFAULT view:
Click on Sort: “Most recent” and “Clear All”
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I worked at Pret A Manger and survived systemic workplace bullying during bereavement that involved HR, the top leadership, HQ and even the now “retired” former CEO Clive Schlee. I declined 4 settlement offers if I am silent about my ordeal. But I rather starve and speak out to help others. For an overview of important blog entries of my experience with Pret, please visit “My Ordeal with Pret A Manger”. The little arrow to the right next to each heading will lead directly to the post. I tell my story for the first time verbally in below audio player interview on a podcast by The Adam Paradox, and wrote two articles in the Scottish Left Review: 1. “Late Night Girl’s” Story with Pret and 2. Pushing Back Against Pret. Thank you for reading/listening.
… from a former Pret employee having survived systemic workplace bullying and gaslighting under Pret’s HR, CEO Clive Schlee and a Development Manager from HQ, who’s also an NLP Practitioner and Hypnotherapist under the National Hypnotherapy Society. On a side note, many Pret leaders from HQ and Operation Managers are NLP practitioners. It seems Pret encourages them to the NLP course, and if one researches on Neuro-linguistic Programming, it is or can be a tool to manipulate people.
As my website has become quite large with various writings from behind the scenes, I decided to create an Index to the most important issues regarding Pret A Manger, that portray themself as this ethical and caring company.
I am still in disbelief myself on what I went through, and writing about it helped me survive and come back to my senses, and expose Pret A Manger! I declined 4 settlement offers from Pret if I am silent about my ordeal and never go to court. I explain in full in my interview at the bottom of most pages here or as the first feature of the below index.
The very fact that Pret did NOTHING after TWO customer deaths, a third nearly fatal, several hospitalized, and numerous warnings ignored, should ring massive alarm bells! But the public remains lulled in, especially in the UK whereas in the U.S. it would hail a storm of lawsuits! The German Reimann family behind JAB, the new owners of Pret, work very hard to divert issues opening in various countries in a whirlwind, more charity work etc.
I write so boldly and loud because I almost lost my life, having been targeted and bullied during already traumatic bereavement. I had several close calls at the bridge and am very proud that I made it through to expose this company!
If this is the only thing I do, having survived this toxic company that hides behind the shiny PR[et] facade and fake smiles, I will do it as thoroughly and detailed as I did when I worked for Pret! I wasted 10 years of my life in this company and explain in my interview how I went through this. This is not about a dis-grunted former employee, this is more. This is about a company that portrays itself to the public as this ethical company and lures in customers as well as employees, exploiting staff for profit. This is just a usual business out for profit as any company is, but the public has been lulled in for years about Pret A Manger and it is human nature to want to believe a fairy-tale…
I confront Pret on a suicide of an assistant manager in 2017 of whom I learned prior to her death. I almost went over the edge, Pret hid TWO customer deaths until it became public, how many suicides of current or former staff happened no-one knows about. I was recently leaked an email that Director of HR Andrea Wareham sent to all Pret shops informing them that two Pret staff have died in two different UK shops. One of them I was told was a suicide, the other person’s death is unclear to the persons who leaked the email. The press is informed and in my 10 years in Pret having had access to Pret emails as I was a team leader, I have never seen an email regarding staff deaths.
Pret must have learned from the customer deaths they never even told us about and also my situation that the truth will always come out.
It is my biggest regret having wasted my time, skill, effort and care for Pret A Manger.
If people don’t believe my story, I have evidence and confront Pret openly on Twitter, Facebook etc. Again, I explain in my interview why Pret is not responding. All I can say to everyone regarding the nice facade of Pret or any company is:
If something looks too good to be true, take a closer look!
The below Index takes openness to read, as many people want to believe the fairy-tale that is Pret A Manger. Only the Unions, Activists and some from the Press know better and look closer.
I start the index with my own story in an interview and continue with general issues, categorizing as best as I can. Any reader and writer, please be aware of the work I’ve put into this website before you just cope & paste and mind the copyright. I have other websites as back-ups. I am open for any interview and article feature, as well as questions.
Any new writings in the future that I may add, I will indicate as UPDATE or NEW.
Index:
Links open in a new window / tab
INTERVIEW
For the first time I share my story with Pret verbally in an interview on a podcast based in California. Interview with The Adam Paradox: (The interview can be played while scrolling through this page and is featured on my website at the bottom of most pages)
> My call-in to BBC radio show of Dotun Adebayo early morning on Christmas Day 2019. The subject of the show was »What does “Christmas spirit” mean to you?«. One of the questions was, if more people are alone at Christmas than it used to be, and what people’s experience is with Christmas in general. As I was up, I just called in. I didn’t speak about Pret, as death and grief is already “heavy” as it is on Christmas Day and I don’t think a BBC radio program would be ready to hear about Pret! I kept it “light” I hope.
(My losses happened in a span of 3 years, not 5 years, I just spoke from looking back on 5 years.)
PRESS
Journalist Amy Sharpe from the Sunday Mirror went undercover into Pret after reading my blog, and having suggested to her to go undercover. I added my thoughts to her report in “Undercover Under Pressure”
I was leaked an email that HR Director Andrea Wareham sent to all Pret shops mid/end of May that TWO Pret staff have died within a month. One staff I was told was a suicide, the other TM the “leakers” don’t have the info. It’s not the first suicide in Pret!
On the below slideshow I added just a selection of staff reviews and comments to save long blog entries. These are from review websites like Glassdoor and Indeed, but also from YouTube, Twitter, Facebook and other websites where people commented on the work environment in Pret.
Just some examples, before the Slideshow, from former Pret employees in NYC, London etc.:
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The above slideshow is just a selection, the list goes on in —> Pret Staff Complaints
NEW
I’m branching out to YouTube, as not everyone likes to read long blog posts. I cover mainly staff issues currently:
CEO CLIVE SCHLEE RETIREMENT
NEW CEO PANO CHRISTOU
NEW 01. July 2019: Announcement of early “retirement” of Clive Schlee supposedly in September, but new CEO Pano Christou is already featured on Glassdoor, probably to avoid further negative voting for Schlee.
Pret Staff work in overheated shops. Customer complaints on behalf of employees regarding excruciating work conditions in 35-40ºC+ heat for prolonged time, weeks and months.
FORCED SMILES & HAPPINESS
for Mystery Shopper bonus, extra cash and fear management
Pret A Manger – Ready to (ch)eat Lawsuits vs. Pret on the “Natural” Food claim while Glyphosate was found in food. Change of signage, packaging and Website.
USA: 2016 “sesame reaction” Lawsuit and Pret doing ZERO
At the bottom of the page: A New York customer suffered an anaphylactic shock from unlabelled sesame in a Pret Wrap. He lost the case, yet Pret still did nothing to label food even after Natasha Ednan-Laperouse died from the same unlabelled allergen in the same year of 2016.
USA March 2019 Court PDF Document of new lawsuit regarding Pret’s “Natural” claim. List of chemicals from page 10 onward.
A customer’s comment in Chicago regarding a deceased Pret employee and Pret in general.
Lastly, THE Best description of SYSTEMIC Workplace Bullying and what I have gone through under Pret’s senior leadership and HR, is summed up in this text I found on Twitter.
I have spent over a year writing my hands into a carpal tunnel (not really, just using a metaphor!) on what I’ve been through in Pret A Manger. I described how systemic and toxic Pret’s bullying is behind the smiley facade!
I can wrap up my whole experience and website in this one text:
Further Staff Reviews, one which states that they felt always being “hounded”. I based more reviews in a YouTube slide on this statement:
“Worked into the ground without empathy”
Smile for the Mystery Shopper – Forced to do emotional labour for cash incentives and fear management (I re-named as the “Misery” Shopper for a reason!)
I worked at Pret A Manger for almost 10 years and survived systemic workplace bullying during bereavement that involved HR, the top leadership, HQ and even the now “retired” former CEO Clive Schlee. I declined 4 settlement offers if I am silent about my ordeal. But I rather starve and speak out to help others. For an overview of important blog entries of my experience with Pret, please visit “My Ordeal with Pret A Manger”. The little arrow to the right next to each heading will lead directly to the post.
I tell my story for the first time verbally in below audio player interview on a podcast by The Adam Paradox, and wrote an article in the Scottish Left Review.
Thank you for reading/listening.
Unless otherwise stated or linked to, this website and all writings within this site are the property of expret.org, poetrasblok.com, LateNightGirl.org and are protected by copyright and other intellectual property laws. Reproduction and distribution of my writings without written permission is prohibited.
Amy Sharpe from the Sunday Mirror contacted me on Facebook after I declined another Mirror Journalist’s request for an interview.
I declined her request as well, as I wasn’t ready for the press, and as I am still paranoid to be tricked and trapped like Pret did with the Development Manager I write extensively about in “The Perversion of a Toxic HR Department“. My experience in Pret is very complex and sounds like straight from a twisted Hollywood script, but I have it all in writing and confront Pret openly on Twitter, which in turn have them report me to get shadow-banned (secretly censored on Twitter & Co. which then hides my posts and accounts from public search). But I urged her to go undercover to see for herself and not just take my word for it, just like James Bloodworth did in Amazon. And she did.
My Facebook message after Amy contacted me:
What I meant by Pret “infiltrating” the mental health club I was a member of, Pret knew about this club as I mentioned it in my last hearing. I write about Pret “infiltrating” the club in my open “letter” to the Pret Foundation Trust which is just a smokescreen to pretend charity to the public.
As I commented on Sathnam Sanghera’s Times article, I’d like to give my two cents also to Amy Sharpe’s undercover article. Both articles from very different perspectives as one from a customer and business point of view, the other from behind the scenes for a few days. But both are equally important and revealing how business works with the main goal of profit in mind.
I have to say that when I saw the undercover reporting yesterday morning (28.11.2018) linked on Twitter, after Amy has been very silent about going “under”, and rightly so, I teared up. I cried when I read her name on the report because not just did she follow my suggestion taking my ordeal serious, but someone from the outside saw what I and many others experience(d), but the public doesn’t want to know about unless it is the press poking into an organization.
It sadly takes deaths becoming public to show how negligent a company, in this case Pret, really is. I’ve been writing openly about my experience with Pret since May 2018 after my father died in March and I started to come to terms again of another loss… still recuperating from my Pret trauma that has “postponed” my grief for my brother. Regular readers know the story.
Some people criticize The Sunday Mirror’s report as being part of a witch hunt, but I don’t think that. The public is so used to be lulled in by a nice and shiny facade, free coffees and cookies.
Customers are so used to the smiles of staff, but no-one knows what really is behind it. The fear management via the Mystery Shopper, rewarded extra £100 if specially nice or told off by the boss in the office and threatened with job security if they didn’t smile non-stop in the highly stressful work environment. I mentioned this in a Tweet response to a customer who without any thought or empathy complained to Pret about a barista, even naming him, for not smiling and rushing the service:
Amy Sharpe’s undercover article to me is like someone understanding this and finally confirming my and the team’s ordeal. Some points I want to highlight as I don’t use the full article, just what I want to confirm and expand upon a little from what this journalist has experienced and witnessed. The article will be in black and my comments in grey. I added the bold to the text to highlight some issues.
Article: A manager reacts in horror as I point out the mistake (of an Almond Croissant with a Jam Croissant label). “Oh my god!” he cries as he switches labels on two trays of croissants – one containing jam, the other almonds.
This is the typical PANIC reaction of a manager who either didn’t take the time or is too disorganized to do the MBWA (Managing By Walking Around) to check that everything is in its proper place, health & safety checks and so on. This could easily be improved by investing to have plenty of staff, instead of cutting staff to save money, so that the Manager On Duty (MOD) can concentrate on checking everything daily as well as throughout the day. It’s a very simple organizational issue. Very, very simple.
Article: In the wake of two allergy deaths, he adds: “It’s really dangerous, especially with everything that’s been going on.”
And yet, no-one steps on the brakes to put immediate, and what CEO Clive Schlee calls, “meaningful” changes in place. The problem with the word “meaningful” to me here is, it sounds too wishy-washy, “poetically” correct but shows no urgency, even though “it’s really dangerous”. The appropriate word should have been to implement “immediate” changes! As Natasha’s parents are in shock over Pret’s procrastination, ITV’s November report:
Article: I am standing behind the counter in Pret a Manger … The pace is so relentless, the demands so constant – customers want serving super-quick – that I find myself under constant pressure. I sense that other staff feel the strain too.
Ms. Sharpe does not give the time of day she was behind the counter, but mentioned having to dash to the toastie machine, so this may have been lunch time. But the strain can especially be felt when a Team Member does the morning shift from 5 or 6am till 2 or 3pm going through two intense rushes: breakfast and lunch. When I worked in Pret I made a decision to not meet with a friend or have an appointment straight after my morning shift having come out of lunch time. I was always like having come out of a tumbler, being shaken for hours and still on electricity. My friends commented on this, so I tried to get home first to clean up and rest and calm down before joining any events.
Many kitchens I have seen with very small working areas for the Hot Chef in particular. Someone leaked a photo to Twitter.
Customer areas are increased to get as many customers / money in as possible; staff areas are decreased. This then creates multiple problems, not only on the mental strain of staff but customers lives as mistakes happen quickly as with labelling I collected in another post “Vegetarians Get Meat Products“:
Or a shop where I worked where there was only ONE multitask room: office, staff changing room with lockers, fridges, freezers, stock room, hot chef soup prep area, chemical room for cleaning materials etc and to top it all, illegally the rubbish room next to the food prep area! This shop was the worst shop I’ve worked in. This photo is from 2015 and after years like this, Pret was forced to expand the work space to separate the rubbish for health and safety reasons. This room was medium size and approx. 15 square meters max. A total nightmare.
Article: I am at a central London branch, where 10 staff vie for space, muttering apologies as we collide and stretch across one another to grab pastries and bags. I shout orders to a barista while dashing to a beeping toastie machine to retrieve a baguette. I make green teas and filter coffees while my other drinks orders are prepared. It’s stressful and confusing and the queue makes it even more so. All the while, staff must be alert to the issue of allergens.
Yep. And as one customer on Twitter pointed out the chaos and stress on the staff and customers alike. I had to console Team Members many times over the years who held their tears back or just cried in the staff room after being shouted at by the manager. Another review: “Better salary than McDonalds or Costa as long as you keep your fake smile up. Staff with more experience cuts corners on Sanitary rules because otherwise it is impossible to finish your batch on time. – The coffee calling system is broken. During busy times it is nearly impossible to keep up with the orders without hating everyone around you. A lot of people cry in the staff room especially in their entry period.”
I also shed many tears on my way home in the bus, especially during grief of course, but after a terribly depressing shift this was a common thing to let the tears finally flow.
I found a photo of the coffee area and it shows how cramped and small the work area is. And the barista/coffee makers are required to get PERFECT coffees out within 1 minute that the Mystery Shopper times to the second! It doesn’t get any more dehumanizing and mentally straining than this. I don’t know how I managed, but we worked a lot in mental and physical pain. Under the coffee machine where the silver jugs are, this working area is so small baristas switch on autopilot and just keep going. Hence, lots of stress, shouting and customers going to Twitter with complaints of half cups of coffees that are made so fast to satisfy the Mystery Shopper, the manager and the long queue.
It is rare that a customer speaks out like this and it’s sad that most customers don’t care how stressful it is behind the counter. They see it, at times even commented about it to me, but they just want their coffees fast. Pret has spoiled them where they would be perfectly happy to wait 5-10 minutes in Starbucks, Pret made the service so fast to get the money circulation into the shops fast. Pret staff are expected to whip out PERFECT coffees within ONE minute and are timed to the SECOND by Mystery Shoppers, while customers think that staff is just happy working under intense pressure. They don’t realize what’s behind that happy facade!
Excerpt:
1 minute aim to serve and another 1 minute to have a perfect hot drink ready, checked by the MS to the second:
“I was served very quickly, after 15 seconds, very quick service.”
“I received my hot drink very quick, after 30 seconds, quick service.”
And then customers run to Twitter with pictures of half full cappuccinos, missing cream, lukewarm coffees…! There’s nothing more dehumanizing at a workplace that I have experienced. And should anyone suffer from boredom, do an experiment and just read through some Pret Tweets a few minutes each day for a week, with the same sweet-talk response from Pret veering customers away from public Tweets to private DM.
Some complaints are legitimate when a customer already spoke to the manager, and yet Pret has a DM button, but customers feel the public needs to be aware of their dilemma in Pret shops. I know, I know I respond a lot to some Tweets, and maybe it is because for 10 years I had to bite my tongue towards rude customers, I take the opportunity now to give my opinion. And Pret doesn’t block me as they collect my Tweets in case for court and certainly to learn some tips, as I have showered them with suggestions for improvement while I worked there. Be my guest, Pret.
Article: Staff now repeat orders to customers to avoid any mistakes. Allergen enquiries are referred to the duty manager, who will show a list of ingredients.
Which is good to repeat, but the pace is still kept high with all sorts of demands, especially for the “Misery” Shopper: always smile, eye contact, make some small-talk, serve within 1 minute, stand on your head, dance on one feet, bend your back, twist your brain, know all the answers, kiss their butts … and all this with a big fake Pret A Smile to keep a low-paid job! In other words you either develop superhuman abilities or mental illness. The pace is the same, the demand is higher, and life is still at risk including the lives of staff who suffer depression, mental ill health and at times become suicidal. But the public “just” wakes up once customer lives are affected. Forget the “slaves“.
A positive Mystery Shopper visit, excerpt:
“The staff member who served me made good eye contact and greeted me with a friendly smile. While remaining focused and efficient, she also took time to engage in a few words of conversation, which added a personal element to the exchange – enhancing the welcoming atmosphere of this store.”
A negative Mystery Shopper visit, excerpt:
“I was not greeted at the till or given a smile. The only conversation was what was necessary for the transaction. To be welcoming the team member could have greeted me and smiled and be engage(d) and positive, the team member could have given me a friendly remark or made small talk.”
— or —
“Team members should smile at customers and may not work when ill, as team member was coughing whilst serving me and was therefore not feeling cheerful to smile that day.”
I wish I could have told this MS that staff are not paid sick leave for the first 2 and 3 days depending on age. So one had to decide if to stay home sick and lose income, or go to work unwell and get a telling off from the manager like I did because I coughed when I happened to serve the MS.
I wonder if Amy Sharpe served the Mystery Shopper and how she would have felt reading a negative comment on her service while feeling the experience of the “overstretched staff” and it being “stressful and confusing and the queue makes it even more so.”
I even wished sometimes customers would just join us for a few hours, especially those who quickly complain about everything.
Just few of the countless Tweets, just from this week:
This customer had good service for THREE years, then one negative experience and the world has come to an end. I linked her to Amy Sharpe’s report to bring some perspective for her feeling so unwanted. But I deleted the Tweet again as I write too many Tweets and always like to de-clutter my Twitter feeds:
So, companies like Pret have created a “nation” of complainers where the British were usually patient and polite, they now cry like babies whose bottoms haven’t been wiped in a while! And the money keeps coming in while Pret responds with “Oh no…” and “Oh gosh, are you okay?…” sweet-talk to keep the babies happy and the money rolling!
I responded, but since deleted as well to this baby who had no issues to call hard working people the “C” word because he was in the “teething” period having his day ruined by a hard avocado. Pret’s typical cut’n’paste response, apologizing while he is offensive, and as if they really contact each shop all day long for repeated hard avocados:
Article: The mantra, I am told repeatedly, is “NEVER guess”. But from what I witness, the speed at which staff often have to work could put these commendable new standards at risk. On my second shift I find an orange juice two weeks out of date on the shelves. The shocked team leader tells me: “You don’t need to tell anyone, otherwise we’re f****d. It is really bad… I’ll throw it away.” One barista tells me the cramped service area is a “nightmare”. He says: “If I’m next to you, you have to shout. If you don’t shout I can make a mistake. A person can grab the wrong coffee. Make mistakes and the customer gets mad. You’ve got to focus, stay calm.” With soybeans and dairy prominent on the menu – and among the 14 allergens kitchens must legally declare – this admission is worrying. On my last shift, stickers are introduced to distinguish between soya, coconut and regular milks. But one barista serves a coffee without a sticker – and a manager barks: “Where is the sticker?” The £8.25-an-hour shifts are tough and I collapse into bed exhausted after eight hours on my feet, lifting boxes, mopping and dragging tables around.
Article: Some staff do 12-hour shifts or work at other branches to earn more. To add to the intensity, employees are battling the cold due to its station location. I wear extra layers to stay warm – there are only two Pret fleeces to go round, so we share.
Nothing more to add except that some staff even do 60-70 hour weeks assigned by the manager! I had to speak out about this as Team Members were exhausted, at times became sick from the amount of work, but were too scared to speak with the GM. Again, I did not make friends with my bosses. But neither did I care!
Article: When the bustle dies down I clean the shop but a colleague urges me to skip certain tasks. “You’re supposed to sweep and mop every day but don’t do that or you’ll never leave on time,” he says.
This unfortunately is common in most shops that staff are so swamped with work they are not able to finish in time and are NOT paid for overtime. I fought for this with my managers in every shop. I would say to my teams who did their best and me as the Team Leader helping them, that if they can’t finish I will mark this on the cleaning rota with an explanation, instead of just ticking off the jobs as done like most do to keep the appearance that jobs were completed. I’d then take responsibility when the boss summons me in the office the next day. I let the team go on the dot when our shift finished at 9 or 10pm or whatever closing and cleaning time the branch had.
Most Team Members have families with kids at home, not seeing their children all day as they are in school, and later the parent is working when they go to bed. So I made it a point to let them go when the shift finished. I was very organized and made sure that the important jobs, health & safety was taken care of and prioritized these. I structured my teams in this way and left the unimportant jobs unfinished if we didn’t have time or enough staff.
In the early times in Pret I would work and work, finish in time and also worked overtime unpaid. But then the time came where I drew a line. It is okay here and there to finish a little late, but it was the norm in Pret and it seemed a very calculated one as Teams worked extra for no pay every day. I struggled with my managers and communicated that if we have to stay longer to finish the job, I will pay them the extra time through the system as was part of my job. If my bosses didn’t want that, then I told my team to finish on the dot and we go home. Full stop.
This of course didn’t make me friends with my bosses, but neither did I care! My friends are not these kind of people who exploit workers for their own bonuses. One Pret staff reviews this as a common practice for managers to give them a job to do 15 minutes before the Team Member would have finished the shift. But the job would take 30 – 60 minutes to complete. I experienced this many times as well and was made to feel bad if I needed or wanted to leave. It took me some time to stand up against this. Pret staff in the UK should do what their colleagues in the U.S. did, a class action suit for not being paid overtime.
I have to be honest that I wished Amy Sharpe would have worked longer, a month or so like James Bloodworth did in Amazon. It would have been good for Ms Sharpe to cover the early shifts and weekends as well, including working in the kitchen, as each time and job has its own challenges. But I’m not complaining. She covered 1 or 2 weeks (?) really really well, while I have 10 years of “material” to share that almost literally killed me having survived bullying during bereavement.
So, I have to be patient and acknowledge the brilliant work by this journalist having been willing to do this, as well as Sathnam Sanghera’s article. And many more people will tell their story in time away from the typical PR that Pret does so well. I keep confronting Pret on a staff suicide in 2017 and who knows how many more are under the carpet when they could hide two customer deaths for two years and the other for 10 months! I know my approach and direct confrontation is full on, but I almost lost my life after having worked with integrity, honesty, very hard and with passion for my teams. I cannot be silent after having wasted 10 years of my life in Pret with the knowledge that staff continue to suffer behind the facade. And if any reader wonders if I went to court, I explain here.
Thank you for your time in reading this. And thank you to anyone in the press to have taken a closer look. Thank you to Amy Sharpe. Ironic and delighted to be calling a reporter a now former colleague of mine! Well done Amy!
Life is short, please be kind to yourselves and others.
expret.org
UPDATE: 14.12.2018 A rare observation from a customer regarding forced friendliness.
UPDATE March 2019 – The first time I share my story verbally in one go in this interview.
Interview:
Above interview is with Adam from The Adam Paradox podcast on my experience in Pret A Manger.
We spoke about gaslighting, “shadow banning” and censorship on social media, as well as bereavement, trauma and mental health in general. I further talked about the significant timing of Pret CEO’s announcement of the £1000 Tweet for all staff. I also talked about a regular day in Pret and how staff have to cut corners, in order to fulfill the immense workload under constant pressure.
It is hard to squeeze my traumatic experience into a podcast segment, but we covered enough to get a good picture of today’s systemic stress environment for profit driven global companies.
I worked at Pret A Manger and survived systemic workplace bullying during bereavement that involved HR, the top leadership, HQ and even the now “retired” former CEO Clive Schlee. I declined 4 settlement offers if I am silent about my ordeal. But I rather starve and speak out to help others. For an overview of important blog entries of my experience with Pret, please visit “My Ordeal with Pret A Manger”. The little arrow to the right next to each heading will lead directly to the post.
I tell my story for the first time verbally in below audio player interview on a podcast by The Adam Paradox, and wrote an article in the Scottish Left Review.
Thank you for reading/listening.
Unless otherwise stated or linked to, this website and all writings within this site are the property of expret.org and are protected by copyright and other intellectual property laws. Reproduction and distribution of my writings without written permission is prohibited.
Pret emphasise BARISTA wages, even though hourly paid Team Leaders are above Barista’s position and pay, and that’s simply BECAUSE many staff and especially Baristas have quit Pret.
And ESPECIALLY after the smoothie/frappe lies Pret gave for years resulting in the BBC reporting on it .
Pret NEED Baristas since many shops open later and close earlier due to even more lack of staffsince the coffee subscription mess. Therefore Pret emphasise THAT particular payrise to the press, despite Team Leader being a position AND pay above Baristas. Only VERY few Baristas will get that “up” to pay, who work at airports and made friends with management.
Pret depend on Baristas to get many and FAST coffees out because coffee is the BIGGEST profit margin and Pret keep pushing the coffee subscription that had many staff quit! A latte for customers means £3.50+, but for Pret means around £40p including cup, lid, milk, water, Barista wages etc.
So, Pret will be delighted to find that social media is on fire with people appalled that Pret staff (supposedly) will earn more than junior doctors, and so getting much needed publicity after all the bad press. Pret very cleverly again use terminology and keep information vague. Quoting the UP TO £14.10 “depending on experience and location”.
Pret via the media announced a payrise in March 2023 for April 2023, but fail to mention WHY they raise wages. The UK government will raise the minimum wage to £10.40 in April, and Pret would be in breach if they don’t raise the basic pay as it is below £10.40 currently (March 2023).
A Pret worker will start at £10.60 in April. Pret always pay 20p more than the minimum wage to appear generous. But this is because work at Pret is so exhausting, staff work for three people, even before the pandemic. But now it’s much much worse, and many staff have quit. The current pay bands until end of March 2023 can be seen below.
Pret say that depending on experience and location, that Baristas can earn up to £14.10 per hour, but again keeping it nice and vague. Pret don’t mention that this is for including the £1.25 bonus which is NOT contractual. And the “up to” pays incl. bonus is at airports and busy railway stations like Waterloo, King’s Cross etc. where the pay for staff and food costs for customers are higher. And airports are even WORSE busy than regular shops! And it’s “up to” £14.10! Mostly it’s less than that for most Baristas.
“Barista pay is slightly higher and will increase from between £10.85 and £12.50 an hour to between £11.20 and £12.85. Pay rates depend on location and experience.” Source: Sky.com
So, the £14.10 INCLUDES the £1.25 Mystery Shopper bonus which is NOT contractual and therefore not guaranteed (many shopsrarely get the extra £1.25 bonus per hour). It can be refused to be rewarded by weekly Mystery Shoppers (see Mystery Shopper reports on what’s demanded from staff), but also by Managers for ANY silly reason. The bonus system as psychology is abused and used to keep workers on their toes.
Hardly any Barista will get the £12.85, let alone the added £1.25 = £14.10 per hour. Most start and REMAIN on the lowest of £11.20 and don’t always get the £1.25 bonus.
Also, Pret shop General Managers who have to cover Team Members (lowest position) to save money and work overtime without extra pay, say that at times Team Members are paid more than GMs.
And a staff who is HOMELESS and has to couch surf while Pret do their PR stunts “helping” homeless people and collecting donations (for tax breaks and brownie points with the public):
I suggest again like I do all the time, that an undercover journalist goes into Pret or at least that journalists wait a few months until AFTER April 2023 when wages across companies are raised, and ASK Pret Baristas from different shops if they get the “up to” £14.10 incl. bonus. I guarntee you, most will laugh you out of the shop!
And Pret here emphasise on Barista pay while Team Leader pay and position higher than Barista. That means Pret are DESPERATE for Baristas as many have left.
Plus, all staff, and especially management work many more hours overtime unpaid. So, if breaking down the pay, it is less than all the pay bands mentioned in below’s chart. Staff are manipulated to work overtime without pay and managers are pressured to CUT labour and then stay longer unpaid. Win-win for Pret execs and shareholders on the backs of shop workers AND managers.
And shops on average have 1 – 3 or 4 assistant managers (kitchen and shop floor) while having anything between 15 – 50+ staff depending on how big and busy/long opening hours the shop is, like an airport or trainstation. So, this “up to” £14.10 is just for a small handful of Baristas, most who’ll be friends with management.
A Barista gets a little over £11 in April 2023 AFTER being a lesser paid team member for god knows how long. You never start as a Barista in Pret, but always as a Team Member. Only Managers who come from other company brands start as ASSISTANT Managers in Pret before then being promoted to Managers again (like it was with current CEO Pano Christou). Any other role in shops start at the bottom on Team Member level with the pay you will see in below chart.
And all the pay bands will mostly be kept at the LOWEST rate for most, except for those who make friends with management, including via the bed room. Sad but true. Please see a recent staff review on this.
And whatever pay anyone gets, they will stay on that pay for many, many years and work for three people. Pret sucks the life-blood out of staff and fool the public.
In my Pret CEO Pano Christou’s Rags to Riches post I go through the various shop positions. Pano Christou loves to tell the press that he “started in shops”, which is true, but he often fails to mention that he started as an assistant manager with more pay, perks, benefits, more holiday, more bonus, sick pay from day 1 (that’s a big one!) etc. etc.
I explain in detail many of the benefits he received from day 1 starting in Pret compared to what a Team Member gets. In brief, the main SHOP positions are very hierarchical. You NEVER jump the line to Barista. Workers start at:
#1 – Team Member
#2 – Barista or Hot Chef (shop floor) or Team Member Trainer (kitchen)
#3 – Team Leader (kitchen or shop floor as both are run by separate Team Leaders)
#4 And THEN Assistant Manager shop OR kitchen. Pano started from day one as AM after coming from McDonald’s where he was a Manager. ONLY Managers from other companies fast track, or rather for them, back track to Assistant Manager position with lots of perks.
Pano just likes to portray to the public that he started at the “bottom”. Typical Pret psychological wordings, knowing the public always ASSUMES things. “Starting in shops” can mean anything! But most assume it means he started as a low-wage Team Member. Nopes.
I worked at Pret when Pano was UK Managing Director, and I was never impressed with him. In my experience, he’s not a leader. He doesn’t come up with any significant changes, he was just the shadow of his mentor, former CEO Clive Schlee, like a clone speaking the same psychological slogans. And even in staff reviews on Glassdoor and Indeed and on social media staff keep mentioning that he’s detached, despite visitng shops to let his boss hang out. In my impression of him, he has his head in the sand and just caters to Pret’s owners, 2. richest family in Germany, the Reimanns under in taxhaven Luxembourg based JAB Holdings, and he wants to build a legacy of speed-opening shops worldwide, while many existing shops are in shambles.
#5 – Genral Manager overlooking both shop and kitchen
And then if they move further up, they’ll go outside shops to become Group, then OPs/Operations (area) Managers. Group Managers get their feet wet by being placed in an area of about 4 – 5 shops before moving on to become OPs where they then look after an area of about 10 – 14 shops.
But let’s go further if we do compare government wages to private equity wages. CEO Pano Christou got £300K in 2020, £400K in 2021 during the pandemic when profits were down and after he cut wages, benefits, bonus and paid breaks of the lowest paid staff. And I’m sure he’s getting another £100K now in 2023. PLUS £4million in bonus in 2021 and counting in the years to follow.
UK Prime Minister Richi Sunak gets £165K, and let’s just forget for a moment that this is just like a waitress tip in coppers for this multi-billionaire. But Pret’s CEO gets more than double in annual wage than Sunak, PLUS millions in bonus.
USA President Biden also gets less than Pret’s CEO, just a fraction less in annual pay. Do your own research.
I took the liberty to change the BMA ad in honour of low-wage Pret Staff who are tossed around like a football by Pret, the government, and now NHS Unions and Staff:
.
.
And this corrupt Tory government are WORTH the likes of Pret. You know why? Because they deserve every mouldy sandwich they can buy.
Now, here’s the current pay rate for Pret shop staff until April 2023 for each position. And as you can see, you won’t find assistant managers on the chart. 😉
Pret just spin the numbers very vaguely, not mentioning the discretionary bonus, and the public falls for it!
I screenshot this table on 13.03.2023 off Pret’s website where it’s linked to via a pdf link:
So, workers, as in Team Members will start 20p higher than the minimum wage from April on. And that’s for staff over 22 years old, mind you. And a Team Leader is really like a mini manager doing all the work, running shops and getting all the blame. I was a Team Leader, I know how excrutiating it is for such a low pay.
Also, Pret made cuts to staff IMMEDIATELY before first lockdown in March 2020 WHILE giving freebies to NHS workers. And later Pret proceeded to cut wages, benefits, bonus, paid breaks etc. Pret workers are still worse off than before. This payrise is due to the minimum wage being raised, and is a complete joke and PR stunt.
And most fall for it using low-wage Pret workers as examples to boost support for NHS staff. I completely agree that doctors, nurses etc. should get way more pay, but don’t use Pret staff and the MISLEADING “up to” £14.10 pay which includes the discretionary (not mandatory) £1.25 bonus to make a point, while you don’t do your research properly and fall for Pret’s vague wording where Pret leave YOU to assume the pay is for baristas.
Use the government’s CORRUPT dealings to prove your point! And stop falling for Pret’s bullshit!
Doctors, nurses and unions should point their fingers UP to the government that always say they can’t afford to pay what doctors/nurses and unions ask for. Yet, the government comes up with multi billions for dodgy stuff. THAT’S where doctors and nurses should raise their voices, and not the lazy way to point downwards to fastfood workers. What a shame!
Use the Billions the government came up with for the track & trace scheme that failed.
Use the £140 million they already paid and the annual £1.5 Billion to send traumatised refugees to Rwanda, a country with human rights issues.
Use the millions upon millions upon millions of pounds for dodgy contracts by many Tory politicians for their families and friends.
Use the wall paper money Boris Johnson spent.
Take your pick! The list can go on and on and on. But no, let’s use low-wage Pret workers. That’s LAZY activism! And it’s also misleading and deeply dissappointing that educated people don’t fact check Pret’s pay for various roles but just fall for Pret’s clever and vague wording.
Point to this corrupt government that use tax payers’ money to spend it on themselves instead of the people and workers across the board. The government AND Pret LOVE it when workers in all fields and skills pick on each other for the crumbs these millionaires throw at them.
Last year Pret TWICE delayed paying staff under dodgy excuses. The second pay delay strategically using the Queen’s Jubilee bank holiday weekend, knowing the public would be distracted should the press become wind of it, which it did as I was contacted by Pret staff and passed it on to The Guardian. AND on Monday banks are closed while Pret promised that staff can get pay on THAT bank holiday Monday.
I was contacted by desperate staff and emailed CEO Pano Christou and openly copying in Sarah Butler from The Guardian, who then reported on it. But because it was the Queen’s Jubilee celebrations, hardly anyone noticed the news. Pret being clever again.
Later The Guardian then also reported that the CEO got almost £4million in bonus and a 27% payrise in 2021 AFTER he cut wages, benefits, bonus etc.
That’s Pret A Manger for you!
Junior Doctors do NOT earn less than Pret baristas! Do some FACT checking and research, and stop using the bottom most rung like Pret and everyone else already do!
The DM I received and passed on to The Guardian:
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I worked at Pret A Manger and survived systemic workplace bullying (in which Manny Matern was part of) during bereavement that involved HR, the top leadership, HQ and even the now “retired” former CEO Clive Schlee. I declined 4 settlement offers if I am silent about my ordeal. But I rather speak out to help others. For an overview of important blog entries of my experience with Pret, please visit “My Ordeal with Pret A Manger”. The little arrow to the right next to each heading will lead directly to the post. An incomplete list on what other Pret staff say about Pret’s bullying environment: Caught in the Act Bullying at Pret. I tell my story for the first time verbally in below audio player interview on a podcast by The Adam Paradox, and wrote two articles in the Scottish Left Review.
The year hasn’t reached its first quarter yet, and this is already the “Staff Review Of The Year” for my annual Pret Year in Review.
Rarely does someone go out of their way to describe the hellish work conditions in Pret like this one. I can underline every dot and comma here. It’s a long review, but so poignant that I want to quote the whole thing here verbatim without correcting any typos as I like to leave reviews as they are in their own words.
I also quote the whole thing here because you have to be registered/signed into Glassdoor in order to read reviews, except one or two reviews, then you’re blocked from reading unless you register/sign in.
I used to post staff reviews DAILY calling it “Quotes of the Day” when I first came across Glassdoor and Indeed. I was shocked to see other similar experiences. I became OBSESSED and read ALL the reviews as well as social media comments from staff.
I wish I’d seen those while I worked at Pret, as I often felt alone in my traumatic experiences with Pret’s top leadership, former CEO Clive Schlee, then UK Managing Director/now CEO Pano Christou, then Head of HR now People bla bla whatever he’s called now, David Carter, Lila Warren the development manager who was used to gaslight me claiming she also had a brother who died in his flat and wasn’t discovered for days, and many managers and OPs managers.
Unintentionally I poked into the HEART of Pret! I explain in detail in the audio player at the very bottom of this page.
I don’t check reviews much anymore, maybe once a month, and this recent one is a treasure of knowledge in how the reality of Pret is behind the facade. This is Manchester, but this is across the company.
I will not comment on any of what the person wrote because the whole review stands on its own, only to say that apart from agreeing with all this person wrote, I can completely relate to the “shell shock” comment. I still heard my colleagues voices outside of work ordering lattes, “extra hot”, shouting, “latte is ready, who ordered the latte!”, the shouting barista: “pick up your drinks!!!” etc. etc. And I still suffer with tinnitus.
While I worked at Pret and went through the horrific bullying DURING bereavement I had this roaring tinnitus in my right ear roaring like a heater-pump in the cellar. That tinnitus type is gone and only returns when I feel stressed about something. But the beeping tinnitus in both ears remains and I’ve learnt most times to tune it out.
And the other thing which is spot on is that all foreigners work in the kitchen and get abused. Shop workers get abused as well, but differently and more covert while in the kitchen it is overt, away from customers’ eyes. But occasionally customers witness the bullying, which I posted here: Caught in the Act at Pret.
I can only implore investigative young, preferably foreign journalists to go undercover into Pret. Amy Sharpe from the Sunday Mirror made a good start after I asked her to send someone in, but she only worked the late shift in the shop for a week. It needs at least a full month in the kitchen AND shop in the morning, and in several shops to see the systemic issues.
Pret love to employ foreigners and also put foreign managers in shops to take advantage of staff. It’s VERY common to have a Spanish or Polish shop manager who then employs mainly from their country and then only speak in their language. This is so the worker, who often just arrived in England weeks before and got a job via a friend, doesn’t learn English. The worker is completely dependent on the manager for information and is lied to left, right and centre. The worker doesn’t know their rights and where to turn to as they trust the manager thinking the manager helped them get the job.
What I want to add here on my blog is that it’s also common for managers, OPs managers and HQ staff to coerce staff into sex for promotion. I’ve worked with incapable managers where it was an open secret how they got into that position. And a former manager recently told me that half of HQ is sleeping with the other half of HQ, even giving me specific names of who slept with who even the very top executives. But I will refrain from naming the names here as even though I believe the former GM, I only post issues with evidence. But it’s very common in Pret and therefore trickles down to shops.
Just a few reviews on this:
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etc. etc. etc.
And the question the reviewer below asks is right, how can Pret be allowed to operate like this?! My only guess is since they are under this corrupt Tory government where many politicians shop at Pret, do Pret get away with even customer deaths and injuries and due to their demand for shops to reach high targets sell mouldy food.
Pret have gone unchecked on these issues, especially in the UK and Europe for years, while in the USA staff sue Pret because the legal system is different there. And the unions don’t mobilise but wait until they’re approched by burnt out staff who have no strength or will left.
A review from the USA from 2014 said a similar thing, that Pret should be reported to the Dept. of Labor, and this is from years ago before the pandemic and is from across the pond. This is across the company as Pret’s executives are the head of the fish that stinks.
And I’ve found the American reviews, especially from the no-nonsense New York staff, amongst the most angry reviews on Pret.
I don’t correct any spelling mistakes, the only thing I do is separate the sentences to make reading easier. I wish people would put spaces in their reviews! Grrrrrr. And I wish I knew who that is, I’d congratulate them for the effort and how spot on it is.
The only thing I want to briefly explain in below review about the “move off the till”. In EVERY Pret shop (sweat shop!) I worked in over 30 management always demand that the 2-3 staff members on 7 tills move from one till to the next to make it appear to Pret that the tills are well manned.
Every button the staff press on the screen is recorded. Every 15 minutes is seen in the system. If one staff uses one particular till too much having 30 transactions on that till within 15 minutes, but the next till has no transactsions, then Pret see that the tills are not manned.
So, staff are ordered by management to move tills to have 15 transactions on this till, 15 or 20 on another etc. I even had a manager who had a timer that beeped every 15 minutes and we 3 staff then had to move to an empty till. It’s basically to even out all the tills while being understaffed.
I refused to move and therefore was bullied. Pret KNOW about the moving of tills, I even told CEO Pano Christou when he was still UK Managing Director. But apart from his usual sweet-talk, nothing changed.
But this is what the reviewer here means by “move off the till”, meaning move till or move to another till. One day out of frustration I tilted the till up a little bit saying to the manager, “I’m moving the till”. Very humiliating work conditions!
Join a union!
Now to the review, my new favourite review! From 02.04.2023 in Manchester:
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“Treated like garbage, unless your face fits”
“A horrible experience for anyone with a strand of morals, decency and self respect. One of the most demoralizing workplaces I have worked at. I never knew places like this existed in the country.
The kitchens are glorified sweat shops but just in Western garb. The working conditions are really poor and I know this is made so not by stereotypes like physically poor working conditions (like dilapidated buildings for example that wouldn’t pass health and safety) or a third world country – but the deprived workplace culture, company direction and standards that exists.
It’s distressing to know sweat shops exist in the first place but to know they exist in the UK and on the high streets of every town or major city in shops like Pret takes my shock and horror to a whole other level. People work like robots for an entire shift in the kitchen with 30 minutes break (unpaid) churning out food for the shop, many of them who don’t speak English or have very poor English speaking skill and have no desire to interact with you. Exploitation comes to mind.
The people working (who are immigrant workers with poor integration) wouldn’t survive in sane decent working conditions unless they were hidden away in a shady warehouse or production plant. Instead they are hidden away in slave driving kitchens like Pret that glorifies it’s upmarket brand while they take as much as they can from their employees and bleed them dry.
If for example these people HAD to speak English and be prepared to do so daily, these people would be jobless which gives Pret as a company A LOT of power. These people, by the way, are keeping the kitchens running and therefore the shops open and they are exploited in the process. I’ve never met anyone but marginalized immigrants which explains sadly what target demographic Pret are looking for to churn out their ‘fresh food’ on a daily basis.
The same can be said for most other staff who are from demographics that represent immigrant workers where job security, advancement and opportunity are already low. Pret exploits this very evidently.
The front counter is a nightmare. Chaos all day, mismanaged and people shouting and being rude and obnoxious to customers. No structure, no team work, NO COMMUNICATION. You’re manic all day and then go home with the echoing of “CAPPUCINO!” or “ANYBODY ORDER A MOCHA?!” in your ear like some form of mild shell shock, and it repeats daily.
There’s no team cohesiveness to gel things together or make it worth the stress even in the tiniest bit. You’re on your own. Everybody for themselves, except the clique of course. If you don’t gossip, don’t backstab, don’t push others around, don’t triangulate and bully etc, you’re not welcome. Managers on power trips daily, along with leaders.
Lots and lots of posturing and this goes on in front of customers as a show of power. Constant moaning, bickering, point scoring, passive aggressiveness. Run by incapable ‘leaders’ who are nothing but manager pets whose face fits, and managers who do nothing for you but talk at you, treat you with utter contempt, demand of you and expect you to guess how to do your job effectively and then undermine and humiliate you if you ask questions or don’t know.
I was told contradictory things all the time by ‘leaders’ which was incorrect as told by managers. Manager instructions would be contradicted by leaders. Do this, don’t do this. This is okay, no it’s not okay. Move off the till as you’re putting too many orders through, why have you moved off the till, move off the till now. Most staff above team member are in positions because of favoritism and very evident discriminatory bias, not through achievement or actual skill and capability.
There are NO leaders, just very insecure and challenged individuals. All staff above team member are in a clique and know each other. Bullying is common. There is a clique around the local managers in Manchester where if you’re not in with them you have no chance from the get go and if you speak out about your concerns, you will quickly be ganged up on and ousted. These managers openly speak in European languages so you have no idea what they are saying but it’s clear it’s an us vs them environment.
Their actions speak far louder than their words. The vibes I got from working this job are some I’ve never experienced before and I’ve worked my fair share of unsavory jobs but this TOPS it. I don’t know how this company is allowed to operate.
Please read the reviews other people have created. They are NOT exaggerated, people are really suffering working for this company, and also please read up on Pret’s controversial history. The customers are also far from happy if you do your research you will find out. I did not do this and I wish I did to save me the headache of getting involved with this company. Avoid avoid avoid. There are jobs you get because you’re desperate and then there are jobs you get because you’ve made a BIG mistake. This is the latter.
Advice to Management
I have no advice for management except to say that management should be broken up to rid the toxic dynamic shared between area stores as this is clearly a main starting point for all the problems as every store is part of an ‘inside’ group where all the managers . This would allow change to occur within individual stores”
I agree with breaking up management, but Pret are not interested in that, the fish stinks from its head. CEO Pano Christou, like his predecessor Clive Schlee are just the smiley clowns of Pret, fooling everyone.
When I read reviews on Glassdoor it’s best to click “Recent Reviews” or “Lowest Rated” to see systemic issues, and on Indeed click on ALL (not just UK).
I cannot imagine a more poignant and detailed review to come this year, so this review will go as the “Review of the Year 2023” in my yearly YouTube Pret summary!
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I worked at Pret A Manger and survived systemic workplace bullying (in which Manny Matern was part of) during bereavement that involved HR, the top leadership, HQ and even the now “retired” former CEO Clive Schlee. I declined 4 settlement offers if I am silent about my ordeal. But I rather speak out to help others. For an overview of important blog entries of my experience with Pret, please visit “My Ordeal with Pret A Manger”. The little arrow to the right next to each heading will lead directly to the post. An incomplete list on what other Pret staff say about Pret’s bullying environment: Caught in the Act Bullying at Pret. I tell my story for the first time verbally in below audio player interview on a podcast by The Adam Paradox, and wrote two articles in the Scottish Left Review.
Pret A Manger and their sister company itsu have become so accustomed to the public believing every lie and BS they dish up, they don’t realise how silly they look.
They live and move in such a bubble, for years having gotten away with lies and BS. Not even customer deaths and multiple criticism, bad press and bad staff reviews faze them. “Them” as in Pret and itsu, as in Julian Metcafe, Clive Schlee, Pano Christou, David Carter, Andrea Wareham, Lila Warren etc. etc. etc.
This screenshot is from a deleted tweet of none other than Julian Metcalfe, RE-founder of Pret and founder of itsu.
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Yeah, low-wage, zero-hour contracted workers love such flexibility because they are so rich to be working at itsu and Pret in the first place!
There is no cure for entitled arrogance.
I write extensively about his connections to the Royal Family, a questionable connection, his love for zero-hour contracts as well as robots, and how I chased him off Twitter.
He kept RT-ing my Tweets until probably someone from Pret educated him of who I am. He then deleted his account. More of his response to me on Twitter which he deleted after just being on Twitter for 2 days:
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I worked at Pret A Manger and survived systemic workplace bullying during bereavement that involved HR, the top leadership, HQ and even the now “retired” former CEO Clive Schlee. I declined 4 settlement offers if I am silent about my ordeal. But I rather speak out to help others. For an overview of important blog entries of my experience with Pret, please visit “My Ordeal with Pret A Manger”. The little arrow to the right next to each heading will lead directly to the post.
An incomplete list on what other Pret staff say about Pret’s bullying environment: Caught in the Act Bullying at Pret. I tell my story for the first time verbally in below audio player interview on a podcast by The Adam Paradox, and wrote two articles in the Scottish Left Review.
I was recently insulted over a hundred times on Facebook by a guy to whom I pointed out Pret’s mouldy food. Warning people about potential food poisoning, especially after 2 customers died in Pret and over 20 got injured from unlabelled/mislabelled allergen, I was met with hostility by this James guy on Facebook.
After a lot of “interaction” and his insults, he posted an interesting comment about Manny Matern without even mentioning he rlast name! Manny is a former Operations manager (OPs) who supposedly gave me a hard time on social media. Once he wrote that weird comment, I remembered I wanted to put an interaction on my blog on how Manny lied publicly under a post on Linkedin where Pret CEO Pano Christou was also tagged in and would be notified to see my post.
I found it weird that this guy mentioned Manny. And then taking a closer look at his photos, there seems to be a resemblance!
I initially wanted to put the Facebook guy James’ comments here as I screenshot all his insults, but I don’t want to give this toxic guy any space here, and ideally I don’t want to give Manny any space. But I find it important to call her out as I had personal encounters with her.
She was part of the management team in an area where I was bullied and she took part in it against me while I was traumatically bereaved which she knew about.
I left Pret almost 2018 when I started to publicly expose Pret. I January 2021 Manny “liked” a pinned tweet I have about former CEO Clive Schlee. Manny knew Clive well as she worked for over 20 years in Pret. She literally clicked “like” on it.
I then asked her publicly on Twitter to press unlike as I don’t want any affiliation with her and her on my social media. I also publicly asked her on Linkedin. For 6+ months she kept ignoring my request.
I finally then asked this request again publicly under CEO Pano Christou’s Linkedin post, tagging Manny in.
She then lied that she never liked anything etc. And then I posted a screenshot of her “like” under Pano Christou’s Linkedin. She then blocked me, which was about time and I called her out publicly, like she assisted a main bully who asked Manny for help against me.
And then, years later when Manny saw how I kick Pret’s butt via myblog and also the press, she thought she could show me some “solidarity” by clicking “like” on my pinned tweet. No, girl, you go back to Pret and keep sucking up to them. As an Operations Manager in 2015 when I was targeted by Ivana, your colleague, you had every opportunity to put Ivana in her place and support me, knowing I just lost my brother.
So, Manny, if you’re reading this, thank James (who looks similar to you) for pointing you out on Facebook, because I completely forgot to put your lie on my blog. back in 2021.
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After months of me asking her publicly on Twitter and Linkedin to “unlike” my pinned tweet, I asked her again publicly under CEO Pano Christou’s Linkedin. Mr. Christou deleted his Twitter account in July 2019 after I linked his Twitter account to the press when Clive Schlee’s “retirement” was announced. He then shifted to Linked in where business people tell him all day how wonderful he is, while shops are in shambles and sell mouldy food.
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Manny, quote: “I have never nor would I like any of your posts on any social media platform …”
Liar, liar!
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I learnt from people like Manny, and the bully Ivana Hrmova and all the other toxic, lying OPs managers to always keep evidence and everything in writing. And now I shove it back at all the current and former Pret execs.
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I worked at Pret A Manger and survived systemic workplace bullying (in which Manny Matern was part of) during bereavement that involved HR, the top leadership, HQ and even the now “retired” former CEO Clive Schlee. I declined 4 settlement offers if I am silent about my ordeal. But I rather speak out to help others. For an overview of important blog entries of my experience with Pret, please visit “My Ordeal with Pret A Manger”. The little arrow to the right next to each heading will lead directly to the post. An incomplete list on what other Pret staff say about Pret’s bullying environment: Caught in the Act Bullying at Pret. I tell my story for the first time verbally in below audio player interview on a podcast by The Adam Paradox, and wrote two articles in the Scottish Left Review.
My dilemma with NHS therapists is mainly unprofessionality. I don’t have the strength to write a long blog post, but just want to highlight something. Please excuse any potential spelling mistakes as I am lazy at the moment and for some reason the spell-check doesn’t work here at the moment. I will clean up this post later. I’m just tired, but still want to share something important regarding therapists.
I’ve had several NHS therapists, all limited to six or no more than twenty week sessions. Some I cut short due to unprofessionality. My last therapist told me within the first minutes of our first telephone assessment which she almost missed, that she is on compassionate leave. Compassionate leave usually means there is a bereavement. Minutes later she told me that she is from Ukraine. This conversation is days after Russia invaded Ukraine.
So, I’m in the dilemma immediately not knowing how to proceed and find myself in the therapist position again, and as a client feeling selfish to be the client while her country is under siege. She is also the trauma therapist who kept telling me from the first session on that “talking alone doesn’t help”. And I told her later that I haven’t even started talking then and now. This therapy was EMDR, this eye-movement therapy, which makes no sense to me and didn’t do anything for me.
My first therapist after my brother died was a trainee, but I didn’t know this at first and assumed he was a bereavement counselor as I asked for this via the initial phone assessment with a NHS person. He later started to talk about some private stuff, how he was a business man before moving into therapy. He even turned up at work when I worked at Pret. He knew I worked at Pret as I just started talking about my Pret ordeal. He knew the area, but not my exact shop. But one day he suddenly stood in the shop and I completely blocked him out in my mind like having a black-out for a few seconds until he reminded me a week later in therapy session that I was very professional. Only then did I remember that I saw him in my shop.
I remember not being happy at all and communicated to him that I’m not comfortable that he just comes to my work, even though it was complete coincidence.
A psychiatrist who did a diagnosis was very “clumsy”. He would not wear a mask in the period between first and second lockdown. He would pull the chair too close to him for me to sit, in a large room. I then took another chair and sat further away from him behind a desk to broaden the distance.
As an effort to gain my trust, he told me in the second assessment appointment that his brother was currently in hospital. I didn’t respond to it but later in an email asked him to not speak about any personal issues. As he knew about my trauma about my brother’s death, he thought he could mention his sick brother to build some kind of connection. No, sir!
Another therapist I had briefly was a psycho-analyst that Pret paid for AFTER I contacted former CEO Clive Schlee, because for almost a year Pret’s HR department kept ignoring my concerns with the prolonged late shifts and then the bullying etc. Pret then paid for short-term therapy whereas before contacting the CEO in WRITING it was hard to even get an appointment with HR. This psycho-analyst at about the third session would lie in his armchair with his back resting on one armrest and his legs dangling over the other armrest as if he was at home or in a pub.
I didn’t go back to the fourth session and never returned.
I don’t know why many therapists, NHS and private, keep acting unprofessional. I don’t understand how they’re trained and if no one tells them that it is inaproprite to speak about THEIR private lives or have inapropriate body language/behaviour.
It puts a burden on the client who then switches into friend-mode or turns into the therapist trying to support the therapist whose country just got invaded or whose brother is in hospital. I communicated that with most therapists that I don’t want to know any of their private stuff, and it’s embarrassing for me to even have to tell this to therapists.
I write all this because recently I watched an interview of an actress that I don’t know. She was interviewed by my favourite talkshow host Stephen Colbert. I don’t care for most actors or guests that come on shows, but I love Stephen Colbert and love watching his work. So, I sit through all interviews of all guests, even though I’m not interested in many of them, mainly because I’m bored with movies and actors. But Stephen Colbert makes it worthwile.
Apart from the AMAZING dress this actress was wearing, she said something that had me think BINGO! Now she can afford many years of therapy, not sure why so long, but if you have the money, why not? And she doesn’t realise what a professional therapist she has!!!
I NEED a strong trauma specialist, but can’t afford it. But I so appreciate what she said about her therapist. I quote verbatim starting where it starts at around 5:37 minutes.
Quote: “I had the same therapist for about eight / nine years … I treat it [therapy] as a car where I want to do the maintenance while opposed when the car breaks down … then try to fix it in the end …
At 6:20 Stepehn Colbert asks Jessica Williams if her role as a therapist is based on her own therapsit, and she says “No” … “I don’t even know that much about my therapist.”
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Eight or nine years with the same therapist and she hardly knows anything about the therapist! THAT is a fncking GOOD therapist!!!!!!!
Further she says, “I wish I did, I’m always trying to, like, deduce what her life is, secretly. Sometimes she’ll let it slip every now and then. …” etc.
And I think, girl, you have a good therapist if after 8 years you still don’t know much about her or him. Of course after YEARS of therapy it’s just human that some personal info slips here and there, but not at the first session or early on in the therapy, and certainly not any traumatic issues the therapist may have suffered or currently goes through.
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Side note, she mentions as well that when she bumped into her therapist at the grocery store that she “dissociated” from her body as she was taken off guard to see her therapist in a private setting. This is a good description in how I felt when my early trainee therapist suddenly stood in my shop where I worked in Pret. I remember going home thinking who I saw that day but couldn’t remember until the therapist told me at the next session days later.
He started the session saying, “You’re really professional”. I replied asking what he meant. “Well, you didn’t say anything.” Again, what is he talking about? And he said that last week when he was in my shop and I just looked at him but kept walking past him without greeting him or saying anything. This is then that I remembered that I saw “someone” but couldn’t figure out who and why it’s significant. On my way home I remember very well thinking “Who did I see today? There was someone I saw…”. I thought that it must have been a famous person or so, as I served many famous people in Pret, but I won’t drop names here! 😛
So, his mentioning this made me remember. But I was in general in great shock about my brother’s death as this was about 6 months after I learnt. Seeing the therapist was then another type of shock I couldn’t process and then just “dissociated” myself llike Jessica above experienced. It’s really weird how the mind works.
When I talk about my brother’s death and how I learnt about it etc. I do NOT want a therapist to think that talking about their brother will make me open up or feel at ease. It has the OPPOSITE effect!!!
YOU are the therapist and I am the client. STOP putting the client into the position of the carer who has to again carry a burden that doesn’t belong to the client for fnck’s sake!
If a therapist ever stumbles across this blog post, please go back to the basics of what I hope they teach therapists in university to NOT share ANY personal information, especially if it has to do with your own traumas, sickness, loved ones, loss etc. And especially not at the very first session or early on into sessions!
One therapist said to me “You have a lot of insight, you should consider doing a course in counselling”. Ok, fair enough I appreciate that observation and advise. I explained that I couldn’t be a counselor because I would carry people’s problems home with me and have enough pain and trauma at the moment.
And this might be my dilemma, I am so broken inside, such a mess, but I come across very strong, with a lot of insight. I can verbalise my own trauma very well etc. And some therapists then might get “tempted” to start speaking about their stuff. I don’t know. But it makes me depressed because I feel forced to put up my guard again and slip into therapist – or friend-mode. It feels and IS unhealthy and simply unfair.
It seems like many therapists want to do short cuts, as sessions are often limited to 6 weeks, by quickly throwing in some private info that they think is similar to the client’s trauma in hopes the client opens up quick and the sessions go on smoothly.
I truly believe that many, if not most therapist should not be therapists and may have chosen that occupation or role to either fulfil their own deficits, or because it’s good money. A regular councelor can charge around £60 for a 50 minute session. A good therapist starts at £80-£100 per 50 minute session.
And if you charge that, please don’t use the client as your shrink!
So, I keep just watching good therapists that I find on YouTube and give up hope, because the reality is that without finances, you simply can’t find a “proper” trauma specialist, not in the UK. My go-to therapist is Dr. Ochberg, even his old videos. A “too-good-to-be-true” therapist.
Since my brother died and everything that unfolded regarding his death, how the police dealt with it, how I had to learn about it, how he was already cremated and so many other complications, how my friends were either helpless or careless and most abandoning me early on, how relatives dealt with it, how Pret bullied me etc. etc. etc. I have become a complicated “being”. A heavy, abnormal load.
Since my brother died and everything else that happened, I have become like this bulky, unstable, loud load that really needed a vehicle to drive ahead, next to me and behind me to navigate through life and keep other vehicles on the road safe.
I didn’t have a vehicle like this to protect me and others from this load. I bumped into other vehicles, crushing them and kept crushing myself with the load. And when a vehicle came along, at best it was more like a bicycle trying to pull a truck out of the ditch. And at worst there was none to help me navigate the load, and worse, there were tanks from several sides crushing me under the load (Pret A Manger etc.).
Where I used to be the most loyal friend, reliable, trustworthy, discreet, patient, giving the benefit of the doubt, I became the opposite of these. Partly through the trauma, through alcohol, in anxiety, anger, hopelessness, not knowing who to trust. But nevertheless, it’s my load, it’s my responsibility, it’s my fault, it’s my sh!t.
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(While searching for a picture of the escort vehicles for abnormal loads, I found this and love their name “P.A.L.S.” Priest Abnormal Load Services. Very fitting for my metaphor.)
I don’t mix the 3 “Fs” well. I have always kept them separate.
If I have family, I have family who are there no matter what. But that wasn’t always the case. If I have friends, they are not my family and abandon you quickly. And a firm, an employer should stop calling themselves a “family” to brainwash employees to work for free and work most of their waking hours spending time at the firm. And if someone offers me friendship, I don’t trust it thinking what do they really want.
I walked through Oxford yesterday with some people who are neither family, nor friends, nor a firm I work with.
The “leader” of the group was like a General who zigzagged us through the town to check off all the events they planned to see. One of the group was an elderly, but still young enough lady who had walking difficulties. She couldn’t keep up with the pace and had another lady walk with her most of the time. I spent most of the day trying to slow the General down and decided halfway through the day to give up and to also walk with the lady at the end of the flow.
I went home yesterday KNOWING that in society people who “slow down” a group / an agenda / an idea … are left behind. I refused to leave the lady struggling at the end of the line. My wish would be that all the group slow down their walk and walk side-by-side with the lady, instead of pushing ahead in passive-aggressiveness to cover everything they wanted to cover on the journey.
That’s my story. I used to have friends until my brother died. Then my friends and the firm I worked with (Pret A Manger to name them) deemed it inconvenient to walk with me at the back of the group.
My family was broken, and are now dead. My relatives didn’t help, rather the opposite.
And whatever else people want from me is just for their needs/wants/conveniences.
And whoever is left, or resurfaces or is new in my journey, I push away when drunk.
I have become high maintenance, where I used to be easy, where I used to be light (in load and radiance / neither heavy nor dark).
I still have so much anger and so many wrongs I wish to right, but don’t know where to start and if I can survive the load.
I sabotage myself, partly I think with the thought that why should I have a good life with good things and good people when my brother can’t have that anymore because he’s fucking dead and I couldn’t change that?
A favourite artist’s music used to carry me through difficult times when I thought those times were horrible, which now seem a far away walk in the park.
Julie Miller’s »At the End of the Road« which, like many of her songs she sings with her husband Buddy, describes the burdens of life in simple words:
In today’s climate, a cheesy song. And this song is from a Christian perspective where God is waiting at the end of life to carry you into bliss. I don’t believe in that stuff anymore, but the song is still a comfort, to at least hope, that I can be some “burden-lifter” to someone without being taken advantage of by false friends, or a firm that exploits without shame, and a family that is none as in some relatives, or a family that is no more, as in dead.
But as beautiful as the song is, and ringing “truth” to Christians who put their faith in the beyond, that at the end of a heavy life they might bump into a god who THEN helps them, I don’t need anyone at the END of my road. I needed someone DURING the journey ON my road, like the lady yesterday who couldn’t keep up with the pace of the group. Then two of us walked side-by-side with her, chatting and giving her the dignity that she is not a burden, but that we love to walk alongside her and explore the town, in the hope she forgets her painful back and legs. I think she was in a lot of pain, but put on brave face and refused to sit down inbetween. She was more thinking of the group than herself. And that’s the shame of our soiciety today.
The ones who really need some burdens lifted are the ones who lift wrong burdens in society.
And as beautiful a metaphor Julie’s song of faith is, it would have been hyporcisy to have said to the lady with her deformed legs and painful back yesterday, “Hey babe, keep walking, at the end of this road over there by the trainstation the journey will be lighter, I will be there. Until then, see ya la’er”.
And how cynical would it have been if I told the lady yesterday that her painful back will be lighter, and that she should just look down on the pavement where there are the invisible footprints of Jesus who carries her. Bye! I’ll meet you later at the train station where I will be there for you. The lady didn’t need to be met by the General and the rest of the group at the end of the road, the train station, but at the BACK of the road where she was left behind.
Or when I had Covid mildly in 2021 and I helped in a nearby cafe as a volunteer “opportunity” (free labour for a business!) and we still had to self-isolate by law, I informed the facilitator that I can’t come in for at least a week. She replied back that if I needed anything “next week” to just let them know. I told her a week later when I tested negative again, that I don’t need anything once I’m negative, but that I might have needed something THAT DAY when I started the week-long self-isolation and wasn’t allowed to go outside for shopping! In other words “call me once you’re better and I can pretend to be there for you at the end of the road.”
I hope the lady with the walking difficulty didn’t feel like a burden or that we showed pity. It wasn’t pity, although I was angry with the General and some of the group. I said to one of the group who was kind to the lady that I didn’t realize I joined the military when driving up to Oxford.
I want to re-write Julie’s text a little for the walking lady:
If you should feel tired and cold And if you need someone to hold you, my friend Then you should feel perfectly safe In the middle of your road There are we to carry your load with you to bear, we-ee are there So when you’ve been long on your feet With no idea when you might meet the rest of the fleet Then onto these arms you can lean
In the middle of your road There’s hopefully NOW a much lighter load for you to bear, we are here …
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The end of the road I am moving towards, where the load becomes light, is the end we all will come to. I simply cannot see an end of a road being that my life becomes “light” again, or that I won’t have anger anymore, or that I will succeed to completely stop drinking, or that I’d be able again to trust people, or that I won’t lash out in this PTSD mode, or that I can trust that there will be someone somewhere, or that I won’t be the one in my family who dies alone in a room or a hospital or a nursing home …
And maybe I can take an offer of friendship at face value without the suspicion of anyone being an opportunist. That’s my fault to be suspicious. And it’s my fault to push people away. I’m not a risk-taker. I rather crush under my load than take the risk to hope. I have no courage anymore to lose people, to lose things.
My abnormal load has become other people’s load they can’t carry. And it is not their load to carry. It is mine. But I don’t know how to shed the load in a constructive and healthy way. And if people come along to help carry some of the load or better, to move alongside the abnormal load to help navigate through the narrow roads, I don’t allow them for fear they crush or leave me in the ditch again. I prefer to crush on my own. Self-sabotage is the load to divert the “punishment” from others to myself.
All I know to do is try to lift other people’s load a little bit. A lady who can’t walk fast and is left behind by a group who has an agenda. Let’s walk side-by-side, no matter how slow.
One of my favourite Emily Dickinson poems may be a favourite because I try to give “legitimacy” to my existence by trying to not be a burden to others, but maybe be able to lift a burden instead of being one. But that’s wishful thinking.
»If I can stop one heart from breaking, I shall not live in vain; If I can ease one life the aching, Or cool one pain, Or help one fainting robin Unto his nest again, I shall not live in vain.«
But even a bird’s feather is sometimes too heavy for me now. I have become selfish, more than I need to maybe.
I can’t apologise anymore. I can only say that I am not the friend anyone thinks I am. I am not what you need and not what you want. I am incapable in friendships and in employment. I am useless in any relationship. That’s my end of the road, and I am there myself to stop walking with my load and just leave it be.
This blog entry will be an evolving one, because there is no answer or moral to this story.
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I worked at Pret A Manger and survived systemic workplace bullying during bereavement that involved HR, the top leadership, HQ and even the now “retired” former CEO Clive Schlee. I declined 4 settlement offers if I am silent about my ordeal. But I rather speak out to help others. For an overview of important blog entries of my experience with Pret, please visit “My Ordeal with Pret A Manger”. The little arrow to the right next to each heading will lead directly to the post. An incomplete list on what other Pret staff say about Pret’s bullying environment: Caught in the Act Bullying at Pret. I tell my story for the first time verbally in below audio player interview on a podcast by The Adam Paradox, and wrote two articles in the Scottish Left Review.
I worked at Pret A Manger and survived systemic workplace bullying during bereavement that involved HR, the top leadership, HQ and even the now “retired” former CEO Clive Schlee. I declined 4 settlement offers if I am silent about my ordeal. But I rather speak out to help others. For an overview of important blog entries of my experience with Pret, please visit “My Ordeal with Pret A Manger”. The little arrow to the right next to each heading will lead directly to the post. An incomplete list on what other Pret staff say about Pret’s bullying environment: Caught in the Act Bullying at Pret. I tell my story for the first time verbally in below audio player interview on a podcast by The Adam Paradox, and wrote two articles in the Scottish Left Review.
Upfront to the WordPress staff who always check my blog posts when I publish a new one. I’m not sure if it is WordPress policy to pass info on to current and former company heads, in this case Pret as I got a certain “visitor” again after I wrote a crucial post. WordPress already moved me into the “adult” section where they only move porn sites to. This is censorship after I believe Pret must have reported me, but I write under free speech and don’t lie, backed up with tons of evidence.
So, if a WordPress staff serves as a “snitch” to Pret, please talk to your line manager and check if this is appropriate or WordPress policy.
Thanks.
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I don’t check Pret staff reviews anymore as much like I used to, maybe once a month. But a recent review from a shop General Manager (GM) got my attention. This GM mentioned among some negative feedback on Pret that CEO Pano Christou is “exceptionally kind”.
Part quote from the review:
“Cons: Expectation to achieve work that is physically impossible, in a timeline that, when broken down, is mathematically impossible. Intense pressure leading to breaking codes and regulations is a common occurrence, and those with stronger ethics end up working up to 100 hours/wk.
Advice to Management: Instead of only setting targets and expectations, map out how they could be achieved. Consider why most management leaves the company they love so much, due to burnout.
With that said, Pano is exceptionally kind and I’m sure he would fix all these issues with more competent direct subordinates.”
And this is where most workers, even managers when young go wrong and are brainwashed. It is the CHIEF, the head of the company who is the problem and who sets the tone for the company. Pano decides on pay cuts and cut workers’ pay, benefits and paid breaks so he can get a pay-rise and millions in bonus.
And why did this GM not approve of Pano and give him the green light (check mark). This GM refrained from giving an approval or disapproval. Very weird review. Confused GM? But it shows how Pano continues to charm and blind workers as well as journalists.
It is Pano who works in Pret since over 20 years, who implements and continues an abusive mystery shopper scheme and sets unrealistic targets for his bosses and shareholders to be happy.
That’s exactly the mistake many staff make, they are unhappy with how Pret are, how they are treated etc. but they don’t attribute this to the top leadership, because like former CEO Clive Schlee, current CEO Pano speaks “kindly” to staff in head office or when they do their rounds visiting shops.
And that’s exactly their game. It’s like a “bad cop / good cop” situation. It’s all a tactic, a game where the CEO separates himself from the harsh OPs (Operations/Area Managers) who are tasked to set high targets that GMs find unrealistic to reach.
CEO Pano, like Clive before him, is the “good cop” and let’s lower ranked staff be the bad cop, but all of these execs have a common goal: make as much money as possible on the backs of low-wage workers and customers.
But THE FISH STINKS FROM ITS HEAD!
In June 2017 Pret held a one or two week seminar only for leaders and managers at the prestigious Barbican Centre on customer service. I speak about this seminar extensively on my podcast in Part 01, Part 02, Part 03 and Part 04 of labeling issues and allergy trial. All episodes will open in a new window.
I speak about this seminar as it was held a year after the first customer, Natasha Ednan-Laperouse died, but NO mention whatsoever on allergens or labeling. No training or retraining. NOTHING.
All we were “taught” was how to continue to “slime” customers and love-bomb them to gain and retain them and then bring back to the shops what we “learnt” (which was nothing new). In hindsight it seemed to me that the development team came up with this seminar where we learnt nothing new to use their annual budget. When departments don’t use their annual budget, it often gets cut for the next annual period.
That seminar seemed to me like a complete waste of time and funds. It could/should have been used to invite scientists and allergy experts in light of the first customer’s death and several injured to teach us on allergens and labeling. But no, Pret went ahead with a meaningless seminar in the expensive Barbican rooms.
The title of the seminar was called “Be Kind – Be Honest – Be Generous”. A VERY typical Pret brainwash which turns out to always be the complete opposite.
I explain on my 4 part podcast episodes above that Pret are far from kind when they did NOTHING after TWO customers died and several got injured, as well as having bullied me DURING bereavement and the systemic bullying culture that exists in Pret.
And being honest? I know from own experience how dishonest Pret are and expose some of their lies on social media.
And being generous? Let’s see how generous Pret are.
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The email invite to the seminar where I got my slot to go:
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Also, calling Pret’s training center an “academy” I felt always as a joke. In my training times in head office, I rarely learnt anything and had to train myself for years in shops searching and reading up on issues myself.
Pret’s generosity
On 18. March 2020 just before the first lockdown when the whole world was still in the air about Covid, Pret made a typical PR announcement to be giving free coffees and 50% food rebates to all NHS workers every day. All they need to do is show their NHS badge and they get a free coffee and cheaper food.
Great. Everyone went crazy on Pret’s “generosity”. And as Pret are Pret, they often make these charity announcements to cover up what they’re doing in the background to staff or other dodgy things.
The very next morning 19. March 2020 I wake up to a DM of a desperate staff that CEO Pano Christou sent an email to all shops and head office with the announcement that Pret will be cutting hours, and with it pay.
DM:
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Pret used the NHS not only for PR but as a smokescreen to hide their nasty cuts to staff. very generous!
Full CEO email here: To NHS Employees. Already low-wage Pret workers basically PAID for the NHS PR stunt.
There was only ONE NHS staff who was disgusted at this after I started swamping Twitter with this:
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Further on Pret’s “kindness, honesty and generosity”
Again, on 1st June 2022, just before the Queen’s Platinum Jubliee I woke up to a new DM by a different Pret staff reaching out to me that Pret for the 2. time this year delayed paying staff under supposedly “payroll errors”.
I immediately emailed CEO Pano Christou but openly copying in the press including Sarah Butler from the Guardian, other journalists and BFAWU President Ian Hodson who, Sarah Butler then interviewed.
Again, Pret cleverly used an occasion, just like with the NHS freebies, where the public is distracted with the Queen’s celebrations AND knowing that on bank holiday Monday all banks are closed.
Part of the DM:
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Pret’s announcement where if staff need money they can get it but with a fee which Pret supposedly would pay:
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On Instagram a staff member announced to be sabotaging Pret now, others called sick as an indirect strike action. Food and service quality would be compromised:
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Is it “exceptionally kind” of Pano to cut pay, use the pay cuts to fund NHS freebies etc. etc.?
WAKE UP EMPLOYEES!
People may ask why Pret would delay pay on purpose, simple, CEO Pano behaves exactly like a manager in Pret does. They have weekly, monthly, but most importantly quarterly targets to reach. June was moving to the end of the 2. quarter. And pay delays with constantly managers “forgetting” to pay hours helps shops and management to reach targets and get higher bonuses.
Pret settled TWICE in New York having had to repay 4000 workers close to a million dollars each time for WAGE THEFT!
Pret was also amongst UK companies being caught to pay some staff UNDER the legally required minimum wage and were then named and shamed by the UK Government.
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Or a few years ago under Clive Schlee, customers started to boycott Pret after finding out that Pret wanted to get young people to get free labour, using the apprenticeship short-term experience to not pay them except via “free food”.
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So, after I emailed Pet’s CEO copying in Sarah Butler and the press and Sarah wrote the following article, but it got drowned out by the Jubilee celebrations.
And Sarah Butler dug a little further later after I mentioned on my blog and podcast that Pano Christou received £300K pay in 2020 but didn’t spill the beans on how much he got in 2021 and 2022 after cutting wages. Then in August 2022 she reported the following:
So, in 2021 Pano got a £100K pay-rise and £4million in bonus while cutting as much as possible from low-wage staff who carried Pret through a dangerous pandemic. In 2020 Pano already got paid more than the UK Prime Minister and about the same as US President Biden. Since 2021 Pano overtook that further.
I could go on and on and on regarding Pret’s “kindness, honesty and generosity” by posting countless staff reviews on Pret’s wage theft, pay delay, missing pay as well as my own experience. But I want to end with my all-time favourite former customer tweet which I could not have put into better words!
I worked at Pret A Manger and survived systemic workplace bullying during bereavement that involved HR, the top leadership, HQ and even the now “retired” former CEO Clive Schlee. I declined 4 settlement offers if I am silent about my ordeal. But I rather speak out to help others. For an overview of important blog entries of my experience with Pret, please visit “My Ordeal with Pret A Manger”. The little arrow to the right next to each heading will lead directly to the post. An incomplete list on what other Pret staff say about Pret’s bullying environment witnessed by customers: Caught in the Act Bullying at Pret. I tell my story for the first time verbally in below audio player interview on a podcast by The Adam Paradox, and wrote two articles in the Scottish Left Review.
She takes responsibility while Pret blame downwards as usual.
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Let’s see some tears, hey!
But it needs to be the tears of a young blonde female.
Nothing new under the sun.
Pret will use that to say “See, not our responsibility”.
Let’s use a new business venture, a female young person to put blame on. Let’s do the usual.
You know the drill.
And it will work. Why? Because we live in a globalised situation where the trend is to suck anyone lower out of their skill, thei rights, their will.
I may not live to see the day, but I KNOW the day will come when Julian Metcalfe, Clive Schlee, Pano Christou, David Carter …
will be remembered via my blog. And as much as the media, politicians like to ignore it. All good 🙂
P.S. Pret A Manger, you have blood on your hands, also with at least one staff suicide I know of, but can’t proof. Lucky you. But I survived. Now go and keep getting off the hook.
P.P.S. keep smiling.
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I worked at Pret A Manger and survived systemic workplace bullying during bereavement that involved HR, the top leadership, HQ and even the now “retired” former CEO Clive Schlee. I declined 4 settlement offers if I am silent about my ordeal. But I rather speak out to help others. For an overview of important blog entries of my experience with Pret, please visit “My Ordeal with Pret A Manger”. The little arrow to the right next to each heading will lead directly to the post. An incomplete list on what other Pret staff say about Pret’s bullying environment: Caught in the Act Bullying at Pret. I tell my story for the first time verbally in below audio player interview on a podcast by The Adam Paradox, and wrote two articles in the Scottish Left Review.
So much so that we printed a label within ONE day of Natasha’s and Celia’s deaths.
One day!
NOT!
That’s how fast we can do things! In fact, we anticipated our customers deaths that we had labels ready to go once they died.
We are deeply saddened by the passing of 15 year old Natasha Ednan-Laperouse.
We are deeply saddened by the death of 42 year old mother of 5 Celia Marsh.
We are deeply saddened by the allergen injury of Isobel Colnaghi in 2017, also from unlabelled sesame in the UK who also almost died, who lost in court against us in 2021 because we successfully blamed one of our low-wage worker.
We are deeply saddened of the injury of David Matt in 2015 in New York, also from unabelled sesame, who lost in court against us in 2016 before Natasha Ednan-Laperouse died. We are deeply relieved that sesame wasn’t part of the USA allergen list compared to Canada.
We are deeply relieved that former Pret CEO Clive Schlee’s open letter response to a concerned allergy sufferer is buried from the public’s eye (but don’t tell anyone that it’s on this blog).
We are deeply relieved that the UK justice system and the media are on our side.
And we are deeply able to label packaging WITHIN A DAY when a higher-up person like the Queen dies.
We’re deeply able to do that.
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The press, the justice system, and survivors keep ignoring what I expose about Pret’s negligence because I am a traumatised person having survived Pret’s systemic bullying culture. People don’t want to listen to current and former low-wage workers if they are traumatised. I am traumatised after what I survived (audio player interview at the bottom of this page).
But I keep talking and writing. And I keep saying that people will not be able to say that they never knew how bad Pret is.
I explain in detail in 4 podcast episodes how Pret were and continue to be careless with food safety, including selling moudly food increasingly. And no-one pays attention, not even the Food Standards Agency that I tagged in many times.
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For a full visual of mould and rat droppings on Pret food as well as on the ongoing mislabelling I explain in my podcast, please see pictures. These are visuals of what explain on the podcast on WHY this keeps happening:
I’m not a professional podcaster or journalist, I just speak from my gut and from memory having worked at Pret for 10 years in over 30 shops, with horrible experiences of the top leadership including CEO, HR, HQ staff and management. I have tons of evidence, including paperwork from Pret themselves. I declined Pret’s hush money and never signed the NDAs they wanted me to sign.
Podcast episodes:
Part 01 of ongoing mislabelling and why staff accidentally take wrong ingredients and mislabel.
One example from even last year, 5 years after Natasha died and 4 years after Celia Marsh died. I explain how Pret work behind the scenes and why it is SO EASY to mistake ingredients:
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It’s profit over lives by under-staffing and pushing low-wage workers to the brim. Pret only cater to the strict weekly mystery shoppers, the emotional labour scheme that Pret implemented many years ago to portray a “happy” facade while ignoring food safety issues. Lack of food safety has gotten much worse, despite customers having died. Recruiting for Personality rather than Skill can be Fatal.
Part 02 I highlight a weird Barbican seminar and the difference between Starbucks CEO’s and Pret CEO’s handling of crisis.
Part 03 Allergy Trial of Isobel Colnaghi in 2021, and how Pret was cleared after successfully blaming Roberto Rodriguez, a low-wage worker. I also explain how training is done in Pret, or rather how it’s NOT done and the dodgy things shops do.
Part 04 In light of the inquest into Celia Marsh’s death and how Pret had TWO types of labelling in place before customer deaths became public, BUT not the labelling that you’d expect from a multi-billion £ multinational company.
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I worked at Pret A Manger and survived systemic workplace bullying during bereavement that involved HR, the top leadership, HQ and even the now “retired” former CEO Clive Schlee. I declined 4 settlement offers if I am silent about my ordeal. But I rather speak out to help others. For an overview of important blog entries of my experience with Pret, please visit “My Ordeal with Pret A Manger”. The little arrow to the right next to each heading will lead directly to the post. An incomplete list on what other Pret staff say about Pret’s bullying environment witnessed by customers: Caught in the Act Bullying at Pret. I tell my story for the first time verbally in below audio player interview on a podcast by The Adam Paradox, and wrote two articles in the Scottish Left Review.
I did 3 podcast episodes explaining how Pret was and continues to be careless on their food safety, even after 2 customers died, a 3. narrowly surived and over a dozen got injured. Pret ignored all that until it got public.
And dispite “Natasha’s Law” in place, Pret continue to mislabel their food and even bring food overnight, not fresh, many customer pictures of food with mould and even rat droppings on.
ALL due to extreme understaffing, high pressure, poor training etc.
I mention a particular Barbigan Centre seminar Pret held AFTER Natasha Ednan-Laperouse, the first customer died. This is significant. I also talk about the difference between Starbucks and Pret CEOs actions in times of crisis. I explain how training in Pret is REALLY done and why Pret successfully was able to blame a low wage staff for another customer injury of Isobel Colnaghi who almost became the third fatality.
I also explain my role as a team leader which is one reason why I’m still shocked in how Pret ealt with this and the money power Pret had, but didn’t use.
Of course people say that I have an axe to grind, but that is not my concern. It is people’s choice to LISTEN to what experienced current and former staff explain, especially when they deliever it with EVIDENCE.
I don’t ask people to believe me if I don’t bring evidence. But I have plenty, that’s why I link to them.
I may do an updated episode with all 3 combined in less time. This the first time I did a podcast and just spoke from the gut. But I try to redo those with notes into 1 episode and in much less time. I’m not a professional, please bear with my simple talk.
But I give a lot of info from behind the scenes.
Below, under these episodes are links to the mouldy food and mislabelling issues.
The first customer who died, 15 year old Natasha Ednan-Laperouse of sesame hidden in the dough of the baguette which wasn’t labelled on the packaging nor the fridge label. Her parents’ campaigning brought “Natasha’s Law” where all food businesses must label packaged food now.
The second customer was 42 year old mother of five Celia Marsh who died in Bath from dairy traces in a vegan wrap. Isobel Colnaghi who almost died also of hidden sesame, lost her case against Pret.
So, the unsafe food practices continue, even worse now. See pictures of mouldy food via below links. And due to the ongoing mislabelling, Pret are now breaking “Natasha’s Law”. A new inquest into Celia Marsh’s death will start in October 2022.
All this is due to ONE reason: understaffing, stressing and exploiting staff to the max. CEO Pano Christou doesn’t care. He lives in La La Land and has never been a leader, even when he was UK Managing Director and former CEO Clive Schlee’s shadow.
He enjoys the money, his mansion, working from home etc. while exhausting his staff. He cut wages, benefits, even the paid break. Most work 10 hours through without a break due t high staff turnover and unreasonable pressure.
Then Pano had the audacity TWICE this year to delay paying staff under dodgy excuses. The second time cleverly using the Queen’s Jubilee bank holiday weekend, knowing the public would be distracted if the press would get wind of it.
The press DID get wind of it because I was contacted by staff in despair as I write publicly and pass leaked info on to the press. I emailed CEO Pano Christou directly, openly copying in the press, including Sarah Butler from The Guardian who a day later reported on it.
She started to dig depper and also reported recently that Pano received a pay-rise and millions in bonus in 2021 after he made temporary pay cuts permanent.
So, needless to say staff are p!ssed off, they are already on the fringes of existance, carried Pret through the pandemic, risking their lives. Some got sick I was told, but were pressured to keep working or lose their jobs.
I’m still hoping there’s an undercover journalist in Pret for at least a month.
Some staff on social media announced to be sabotaging Pret now (see screenshot below). Many call sick as an internal strike action. All of this contributes to unsafe food handling, stale, expired food, mislabelling, exhausted staff etc. etc. etc.
Pret got away with 2 customer deaths and multiple injuries, so they feel invincible and the lack of food safety has gotten much, much worse iin broad daylight.
Writing to journalists and the government food safety people didn’t help yet. How many people have to die? A small independent, and especially minority business would have been shut down and the owners sent to prison if one customer had died. Pret is protected and safe in this Tory government of corrupt politicians.
Staff on Instagram in June when Pret for the 2. time delayed pay:
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I worked at Pret A Manger and survived systemic workplace bullying during bereavement that involved HR, the top leadership, HQ and even the now “retired” former CEO Clive Schlee. I declined 4 settlement offers if I am silent about my ordeal. But I rather speak out to help others. For an overview of important blog entries of my experience with Pret, please visit “My Ordeal with Pret A Manger”. The little arrow to the right next to each heading will lead directly to the post. An incomplete list on what other Pret staff say about Pret’s bullying environment: Caught in the Act Bullying at Pret. I tell my story for the first time verbally in below audio player interview on a podcast by The Adam Paradox, and wrote two articles in the Scottish Left Review. Thank you for reading/listening.
Let’s do a little bit more digging into Julian Edward Metcalfe, founder of itsu and re-founder of Pret A Manger. This is just a brief “case study”, not a deep dive into Metcalfe’s family line as I want to highlight something specific.
And dear journalists, maybe one day you may give credit where all the research I do for free and ALWAYS credit/link to the source where I found the information, my experience and encounters with these people comes from.
Also, to British people especially journalists, I write so detailed as if I was teaching a school class because I have many American readers who are not familiar with who’s who in the Royal Family.
Julian Metcalfe is the founder of itsu and what I call the co-RE-founder of Pret A Manger. I explain below.
Julian’s father: David Patrick Metcalfe.
The Duke of Windsor (who before that was King Edward VIII, Queen Elizabeth’s uncle) was David Metcalfe’s godfather.
Julian’s grandfather: Edward “Fruity” Metcalfe.
Edward Metcalfe was best man to then recently abdicated King Edward VIII and American actress Wallis Simpson. This led to Queen Elizabeth’s father becoming king.
Julian’s great-grandfather: George Curzon, 1st Marquess of Kedleston.
I will mention him later from an interesting tweet.
Quote from The Telegraph article about Julian Metcalfe’s parents:
»The couple had two sons and a daughter, but divorced in 1964; two years later Alexa died after taking what a pathologist at the time suspected was “a sleeping draught”. Their children, including Julian Metcalfe, the future founder of the Pret A Manger sandwich chain, moved back to live in great style with their father. “We had powerful people to dinner all the time,” Julian Metcalfe later recalled of his childhood.«
Another quote about David Metcalfe, Julian’s father which shows how Julian grew up in the highest society and privilege: »Friends celebrated (David) Metcalfe as “the last man about town with a bit of style”. At his home in Wilton Street, he was host to “everybody who is anybody”.«
And of course with all these connections to the Royal Family and high society, Julian Metcalfe has an OBE.
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Now let that melt on your tongue like a mouldy Pret sandwich: Julian Metcalfe’s FATHER was the godson of King Edward VIII, who gave up his “kingship” to be with Amercian actress and *scandal scandal* divorcee Wallis Simpson. Prince Harry repeated that, but he didn’t have much to lose.
Let’s do some brain-fnck here:
Prince William is the great-grand nephew of King Edward VIII (later Duke of Windsor), giving the OBE to great-grand son of best men to King Edward VIII – or – son to godson of King Edward VIII / Duke of Windsor.
Got it?!
Oh, what a coincidence!
Katschink!
Is there any wonder that some call Pret a “British institution”?
The million dollar question is: Who is Julian Metcalfe’s godfather? Prince Philip? Or even Prince Charles if he wasn’t too young to have become godfather? Metcalfe’s Wikipedia entry is mighty quiet about all his royal connections.
In his full Q&A at the Oxford Union I noticed one thing very predominantly, Julian is constantly portraying that he fell into success by accident. He pretends to be clueless, admits that he was lazy in school and that success supposedly just keeps falling into his lap, as if he’s such a talent where everything he touches just happens to turn to gold.
In reality, I believe that from what I read in the press, his foot-in-mouth disease in his tweet exchange with me and the itsu staff reviews (see my YouTube slide further below), that he is a spoiled prat who had enough money to re-start Pret after it didn’t succeed the first time around.
I write so blunt because of how he treats his staff and his indifference to the health and life of people in general.
And I, a NOBODY chased him off Twitter simply because this prat isn’t used to getting challenged! When you read the staff reviews of him that I linked to him on Twitter and later put on my YouTube slide, it’s very visible that he must be a very aggressive, angry and patronizing person. His staff must be in sheer fear around him. He is used that everybody hushes around him or is part of his harsh environment. Most journalists kiss up to him and business people worship him. And then little me comes along, challenges him for 5 minutes and he tucks his tail between his legs and dashes off after just 2 days on Twitter!
Most of you who read this are perfectly fine with rich people, especially men, to treat HUMAN BEINGS on low wage like sh!t. But you counter me, a “nobody” when I speak out, because you are upset that YOU don’t do the same.
In his Oxford Union Q&A he keeps portraying to be falling into success by accident. One itsu staff review hints at this very strongly in a shocking review calling him “oafish”.
Click Ctrl & + to enlarge the screenshot or just read the full review via the link underneath. Ctrl & – to decrease the size again.
For people with visual impairment where audio reading programs cannot read screenshots, I just quote a few highlights from above review, quote:
»Toxic leadership, Favouritism, Lack of Diversity, Poor Management, Cruel CEO/Founder
JULIAN METCALFE the oafish chaotic founder who insists on being involved across all areas despite having little to no knowledge in anything apart from sales and operations. He wanders the office behaving as if he’s a cutesy naive child and then behind closed doors will overtly disrespect and bully those that work directly with him. Have noticed him being very sexist, making racist jokes in front of minority staff, and regularly shouting loudly and aggressively at managers TIL they’re in tears. (A technique which his leadership team mimic) – head office is in constant turmoil and there’s a very high staff turnover due to people leaving after breakdowns or lack of support (mainly Julian’s mistreatment) or by being discreetly fired when Julian decided he’s displeased. – schoolgirl gossiping, hostility and aggression amongst department heads.
… When you have your employees shaking with stress and fear who call the police on your c.e.o. Due to an uncomfortable environment that is probably a wise time to step in.«
End of quote.
This and other similar reviews I linked to Metcalfe on Twitter, causing him to delete his account shortly after.
A recent little video appeared on Twitter with the title “Why I h8 itsu”.
Just click the play |> button or click the Twitter link under this video:
As I write on Pret and also “chased” Metcalfe off Twitter (please see YouTube player below) I get contacted now as well by itsu staff and customers. One email I received was last year:
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Quote for people with visual impairment where programs can’t read screenshots:
“Hey there! I saw your Twitter and how you faced bullying and abuse from Pret. I’ve recently been doing research into Julian’s other company Itsu as I’ve been a consumer of it for a while. However, there are massive racist notions and cultural misappropriation that I’ve found and hoping to gain support from for the company to make actual changes. Would you be interested in seeing what I have over email or Discord or anything else?”
Other reviews along those lines where Metcalfe is directly mentioned as being accused to being sexist, racist, aggressive etc. I put on my YouTube slide below together with his deleted tweets that I screen-grabbed before he deleted.
I find his facial expression, tone of voice and choice of words pretty intense to put it lightly. But of course an appearance or impression doesn’t prove anything. Many people, especially in the business world fall for this and mistake this for “passion” or “being passionate”. What I see is aggression and anger. And I also noticed that half the questions he is asked, he doesn’t answer except with the same supposedly “humility” of saying that he doesn’t know what he’s doing. Anyone taking a closer look? Anyone REALLY look at his words and demeanor, and see something here?
Many of these itsu staff reviews keep pointing out that he behaves like a clueless child, before then aggressively “undoing” months worth of work.
I linked some of these reviews to Metcalfe on Twitter. He must have been warned by Pret about who I am, as he then suddenly deleted some tweets and his Twitter account completely after being on there only for 2 days.
Most of his tweets I took screenshots of before he deleted it as I was gobsmacked that he even responded to me and kept retweeting my tweets. I think someone in his PR department needs to get fired, unless he doesn’t listen to them. I placed most of his deleted tweets here on YouTube:
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I use YouTube because my blog where I expose the REAL Pret A Manger from behind their happy facade, is heavily censored and completely blocked on Facebook and Instagram. But they can’t block YouTube. Pret must have reported me to social media, Twitter is regularly censoring me, but this forced me to spread out onto other sites and thus expose Pret on a much broader spectrum. Thank you very much Pret. 🙂
What’s crazy is, that after I also chased Pret CEO Pano Christou and former CEO Clive Schlee off Twitter (Pano “hides” on Linkedin where people tell him all day long how wonderful he is), I tweeted to Metcalfe that we will see how long he will last on Twitter. I had a laugh basically, not realizing he’d delete his account a day later!
Note: I changed my Twitter handle from @LateNightGirlMe to @expretDOTorg as Clive Schlee patronized me, calling me his “late night girl”. So I took that, turned it around and created my blog latenightgirl.org which will lead to expret.org. I created a Twitter handle to throw it back at him publicly. But I changed the handle as it doesn’t make much sense for new readers who are unfamiliar with my story.
But I know how this shocked Clive when he first learnt of my blog and then qucikly made the £1000 announcement to all staff to counter my writings. I write about the timing of the £1000 for all staff in The Day Clive Schlee had a Bright Idee.
And as my handle is changed, it is now under my new handle on Twitter itself. Also, as Metcalfe deleted his account, you don’t see his handle in the tweets anymore, only the screenshots I took at the time show it.
Excuse my strong words, but I struggle with anger after what Pret put me through:
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No response is a response Will see how long you can hold on Twitter
Pano Christou deleted his Twitter account on 01. July 2019 after I tweeted Clive's retirement plans to the press. Clive's account was deleted in July 2020
I know these 2 are #cowards, Pano hides on Linkedin >
— Ex Pret A Manger -Exposing Pret since May2018 🇺🇦 (@expretDOTorg) October 30, 2020
And if people put his deleted handle @JulianEMetcalfe into Twitter search, they will only see the replies from people to Metcalfe, but not his handle anymore.
THERE ARE TWO JEFFREYS that Julian Metcalfe doesn’t want to be connected to.
The first is the late Jeffrey Hyman, the original Pret founder, opening the first shop in 1983 Hampstead but didn’t succeed. He sold the brand, name and logo to Julian Metcalfe and Sinclair Beecham. But Pret, Julian Metcalfe, his friend and business partner former Pret CEO Clive Schlee who owns half of itsu, and current CEO Pano Christou all refuse to mention or honour Hyman.
And yet, Pret keep using Hyman’s original Pret logo/font in their head office and in at least one shop, in Victoria. I made the below photo in about 2020 or 2021 outside one of Pret’s Victoria shops when I walked by, knowing about this original Pret sign that I saw for the first time in Pret’s Victoria 75B Bressenden Place head office, and then later again in below tweet of Hyman’s first Pret shop.
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This logo was used by Hyman in 1983 when Pret was like a deli and then sold to Metcalfe and Beecham. Pret use it as a retro sign in head office and at least one shop, yet Pret and Metcalfe refuse to mention Hyman. A plaque is dedicated to Metcalfe and Beecham, but no mention whatsoever on Jeffrey Hyman.
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And maybe Pret cleverly mention the first Pret shop AND kitchen to say later that Hyman’s shop didn’t have a kitchen?
Since about 2 – 3 years Pret now have the brainwash words above shops and sometimes packaging, simply saying “London 1986”. This way, every customer who walks into a Pret shop gets brainwashed of the opening in 1986 by Julian Metcalfe and Sinclaire Beecham, instead of in 1983 by Jeffrey Hyman.
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A friend of Hyman told me on Twitter that Pret employed someone to keep deleting Jeffrey Hyman and the 1983 opening of Pret from Wikipedia:
THE OTHER JEFFREY that Metcalfe doesn’t want to be connected to is Jeffrey Epstein.
Epstein who’s the convicted pedophile whom many believe was “suicided” in prison. It does not need to mean anything that Metcalfe is in Epstein’s address book, as Epstein was collecting data from many rich and influential people he met or knew. But it’s still interesting. I write about how I came to this info on Julian Metcalfe in Jeffrey Epstein’s Little Black Book.
As I “chased” Metcalfe off Twitter, blogged about it and made this slide on YouTube showing his deleted tweets, itsu staff or people who are familiar with Metcalfe issues contact me. This is how I became aware that Metcalfe is in Epstein’s “little black book”. Again, this doesn’t mean anything as Metcalfe’s 2. wife Brooke Douglass de Ocampo was a New York society writer and therefore well connected. But I still find it interesting. It’s clear that the rich and famous are connected, often dating back decades into the past. Not to mention Prince Andrew’s direct friendship with Epstein and Metcalfe’s family connections with the Royal Family. They all know each other.
It’s one big happy family. This and Metcalfe’s close friendship to Clive Schlee, who is Pano Christou’s mentor, is why Pret cannot be distanced to Metcalfe when he made his ‘eugenicist’ statements to the Daily Mail and continued to rant on Twitter before deleting his account. Not to mention how Pret ignored TWO customer deaths and over a dozen injuries before it got public. Not to mention how awful Pret treat their staff. That’s from my own traumatic experience and what staff review on Glassdoor and Indeed, press articles etc. etc.
After I linked itsu staff reviews to Metcalfe on Twitter, he kept putting his foot in his mouth saying that anonymous staff reviews are biased. Well Mr. Metcalfe, this then also goes for the positive reviews. You can’t have it both ways.
One of his responses I didn’t include in my YouTube slide where I put most of his deleted Tweets. But he had the arrogance and audacity to claim that his low-wage staff “begged” for zero hour contracts. He also aims to turn shops mostly into robots and machines serving customers, eliminating labour costs to advance his net-worth £215 million personal empire.
Pret as well as itsu staff are also mainly “trained” via iPads on their free time during break or after work. There’s little to no training in both companies. And whatever training there is, workers have to do unpaid in their free time.
Greed is a bottomless pit.
Please note that my Twitter handle used to be @LateNightGirlMe after Clive Schlee called me his “late night girl”. So, to throw it back at hi, I took that offense and created my blog under latenightgirl.org & Twitter name. I changed it as it doesn’t make much sense for people, and to keep my blog URL visible as it’s often censored on social media platforms. I explain the “late night girl” issue in the audio interview at the very bottom of this post.
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What a clown!
He actually wrote that! As if low-wage workers who are already paid the minimum possible, have so much money to spare to afford being flexible with their time. Anyone who wants to have flexibility to work can afford it and does not need a low-paid shitty job like itsu or Pret. I’ve rarely been held for such a fool. And before anyone mentions that Pret and itsu have “happy”, smiley staff, do some research on their strict and micromanaging mystery shopper scheme.
If people just take a slight look at his business dealings, it becomes very visible that he does NOT care whatsoever about workers, labour rights, building up a healthy workforce etc. He is your “average” greedy, entitled business men, coming from privilege but pretending to be an entrepreneur having started from nothing.
His “survival of the fittest” attitude is not just evident in his ridiculous lack of being media savvy to the Daily Mail (or his PR rep was on holiday), where he was happy to sacrifice the elderly and vulnerable people to save his millions, but in an iterview with The Telegraph. The heading quotes Metcalfe: »Only the fittest will survive high street cull, warns Itsu and Pret founder Julian Metcalfe«.
I didn’t even know about the ads that Metcalfe did with women athletes he later tried to justify to me in his (now deleted) tweet after I linked staff reviews to him saying he’s a sexist. Just after he mentioned this I researched and found this ad in The Evening Standard:
»Women who are not trying to be men!«??? What insecure talk is that Mr. Metcalfe?
Julian’s great-grandfather which led me to reasearch a little.
George Curzon, 1st Marquess of Kedleston.
I started to dig a little deeper into Metcalfe when I saw the following tweet after Metcalfe made his lock-down comments to the Daily Mail:
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Julian Metcalfe took a page out of his great-grandfather's book. George Curzon, 1st Marquess of Kedleston cut rations during the Indian famine, claiming "indiscriminate alms-giving" was a public crime. Millions died. So what if a few thousand die to save a sandwich chain? pic.twitter.com/LKMCPv8pfO
And of course I need to mention Metcalfe’s buddy Clive Schlee with whom I had shocking encounters that I explain on the audio player interview here at the bottom of this page. Metcalfe and Schlee have been friends and business partners since decades. Metcalfe gave Schlee the CEO spot in Pret.
I found an interesting lawsuit that was won by a former itsu partner who claimed he was booted out by Metcalfe and Schlee. He won his court case and received an undisclosed compensation amount, probably in exchange for signing a NDA so the amount cannot be disclosed.
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Quote from The Caterer article: »A senior chef last week won his unfair dismissal case against Julian Metcalfe, founder of both the Pret A Manger sandwich-shop chain and Itsu sushi restaurants in London.
Clive Fretwell, who had worked for 14 years at Le Manoir aux Quat’Saisons, told a Woburn employment tribunal he had been recruited in 1988 to help develop a chain of Itsu restaurants.
He said the intention had been to give him a 2.5% founding stake in the business and an additional 10% in two years, with the possibility of “big money” if it were sold.
When a second restaurant, which opened two years later, failed to live up to expectations, Fretwell claimed he became aware that Metcalfe and Itsu co-director Clive Schlee were trying to get rid of him.
He said he was told last July that the company could not afford his salary, and he was dismissed in August.
The compensation agreed was undisclosed.«
»… trying to get rid of him« sounds very familiar to me. I wasn’t even a “partner” with a certain percentage stake in Pret, just a small fish, an underpaid and overworked team leader. But I raised big concerns and trauma on Pret’s systemic bullying culture where they tried to get rid of me as soon as I became bereaved.
In an The Independent article about the lawsuit Clive Fretwell described Metcalfe as a “strong personality”.
It’s worth doing some research into Clive Fretwell who is a respected chef having learned in France and cooks “proper” cuisine.
Staff and workers help Pret (and itsu) to build their brand and ONLY if they are part of their elite group of like-minded people who are only out for profit and having a laugh on the costs of workers, are they protected. If they’re not part of their way, regardless how hard they work and help make the brand successful, they’re out. That’s why the Pret Foundation Trust is a joke, a smokescreen to hide ruthless practices behind the happy facade and a PR stunt for brownie points with the public. I had NO help from the Pret Foundation when I became bereaved and then bullied by the core people of Pret.
Not even when I specifically asked via email (in writing) to be placed under the PFT, and EVEN a longtime OPs manager asked this in writing via a disciplinary hearing.
Nopes. Nada. Instead, upon HR’s request run under David Carter, then head of HR, I was gaslit via another HQ staff and then fired days after my dad came out of a three-week coma. The more and the louder Pret, itsu and any large corporation talk about their good deeds, intentions and charity, the closer you need to take a look.
Since writing about Pret publicly for 4+ years now and all the social media posts I read and boycotts customers announced, one tweet is my alltime favourite tweet that puts down in a nutshell who Pret really are, I could not have said it in any better way:
Betty tweeted this in response to a call to boycott Pret after they made the pandemic temporary paycuts permanent, which came to no surprise to me. And Pret twice this year delayed paying staff, the 2. time using the Queen’s Jubilee bank holiday weekend, knowing the public would be distracted should the press get wind of it and banks are closed on bank holiday Mondays.
I immediately emailed CEO Pano Christou himself, openly copying in journalists including Sarah Butler from the Guardian who then reported on it. She also reported later, recently in August that CEO Pano Christou got a payrise and millions in bonus after cutting staff wages and benefits in 2021 during the height of the pandemic. I predicted that this would be the case back in April on my podcast.
A current Pret staff announced on Instagram that staff now sabotage Pret from within:
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And apart from the extreme under-staffing, even before the pandemic, this sabotaging as well as stressed workers leads to unsafe food practices. Mould and rat droppings on food as well as ongoing mislabelling of food.
I always say that all the slogans Pret have on their walls, all the sweet-talk, the ethical bla bla, all the “charity” Pret announce on their marketing and walls, you can be sure that 9 out of 10 times it’s the complete opposite. And the same goes for itsu. The nonsense Julian Metcalfe always says how much he cares for staff etc. while when you look at him speaking without the sound on, he looks angry, tense, and his words are “strong” to say the least. Clive Schlee is more slick, he was the Ronald McDonald clown for Pret. The smiley mascot hypnotising customers and staff with sweet-talk while having a horribly abusive mystery shopper scheme in place and naming, shaming and blaming shops publicly to the whole company when they fail.
At least Pano already removed the stupid brainwash slogan “lovingly handmade” from the packaging since I’m exposing Pret’s toxic bullying culture and unnecessary high stress. That one got the most on my nerves.
The sheer perversion of Pret’s conduct still has me speechless like it’s straight out of a twisted Hollywood script. I have no other word at the moment than to call this “perversion” what Pret did, my ordeal reaching to the top leadership. It couldn’t have gotten any higher than that. That’s why Pret don’t sue me and Julian Metcalfe upon learning who I am tuck in his tail and ran for the hills. But I have it all in writing. And when people ask why I didn’t go to court, I did, and I explain in detail in my audio interview at the bottom of this page.
I experienced and witnessed it many times as well as reading staff reviews on the favouritism that reigns in Pret while hard working people with skill are dumped like dirt, and the crooked staff take all the credit for the success skilled people bring to the company.
Further in the Telegraph article about Julian’s father David shows how frequent and used Julian was to mingle with the richest people and royalty. And there is then no surprise that he had connections to Jeffrey Epstein. Julian can’t help himself to be set apart from “normal” hard working people, using “lower classes” to advance his rich lifestyle. He doesn’t know it any other way while pretending to care.
Further quote about Julian’s father David: »In particular (David) Metcalfe had a flair for pairing New World entrepreneurs, ambassadors and tycoons with Old World aristocrats, intellectuals, royalty and social commentators. His dining table was frequented as much by dukes and royalty as it was by Detroit and Texas tycoons and politicians from across the political spectrum.«
Julian’s ex-wife is from the USA and is mentioned in Jeffrey Epstein’s little black book. It always comes around full circle. These people mix and mingle with each other, and it all remains with the richest people while claiming to be a trail blazing entrepreneur starting from nothing.
And as far as I have read in my research, I have not found anywhere that Julian mentions his connections to the Royal Family via his father and grandfather. I believe he doesn’t mention it as he wants to be seen as this groundbreaking entrepreneur having started from scratch. Many entitled rich people want to be seen as “self-made” millionaires while having gotten huge starting packages, loans or gifts from family to start or restart a business.
Little side note that I don’t know enough of to get into further, but “ARK” is from a quote on reddit, »Absolute Return for Kids (ARK), is an international children’s educational charity based in the UK. ARK held fundraisers every year from 2002 to 2012. Dozens of people listed from Jeffrey Epstein’s Black Book attended these ARK Galas.«
CHILDREN’S charity and Jeffrey Epstein go together like Pret A Manger/itsu go together with Trade Unions! *Irony off*
Also note, the woman in the picture is Pippa Holt, not Metcalfe’s ex-wife Melanie. This is just what I found in connection with this ARK charity gala event.
Current Pret CEO Pano Christou does the same, having learnt how to BS the public under Clive Schlee, portraying that he started in shops as if to say he started at the bottom. He started in shops alright, but he started as an assistant manager having come from McDonald’s management. Pret’s assistant manager role is position #4 in the shop hierachy. The lowest, #1 position is Team Member; 2. Hot Chef or Barista; 3. Team Leader (kitchen or shop) and then #4 is assistant manager before becoming the shop general manager.
He started with higher pay, £500 business attire that Pret paid for, monthly £50 to dry clean his clothes, “business” travels, management parties and galas, and all the perks that are thrown at assistant managers and higher up management.
Pano did not start at minimum-wage, wearing a Pret uniform and a silly cap with pins that could have dropped into food while staff weren’t allowed to wear jewellery or piercings. He didn’t labour for 9-12 hours in the high paced, noisy kitchen being shouted at by leaders and management. Since I point this out on my blog, he finally mentions in interviews that he started as an assistant manager instead of how he always said that he started “in shops” where people assume he was a low-paid team member.
Back to Metcalfe, many in the press and certainly business people love this success story, not wanting to hear how Metcalfe really is, as “success” often only comes when exploiting the masses and being “someone” regardless what it does to society as a whole.
Maybe Jeffrey Hyman’s friends, who occasionally mention him on Twitter at his birthday or anniversary of his death want to write a book about Hyman and make him known to the world, since Pret and Metcalfe refuse to honour, refuse to even mention him while using Hyman’s original font/sign. If you don’t want to mention or credit to the original person, at least have the integrity to not use anything the original person created as in an old font/sign.
Oh silly me! Pret/itsu and integrity?
Pret remain Pret, they lie, steal, manipulate and exploit in any way they can. Just your good ole greedy corporate, owned by in tax-haven Luxembourg based private equity firm JAB Holdings under the second richest family in Germany, the Reimanns with an extensive Nazi slavery past. And itsu now hooked up with Bridgepoint, Pret’s previous owners. And the real reason that Mectalfe hooked Pret up with McDonald’s was to get Pret into the U.S. market. Once in, they “divorced” their “marriage of convenience”. When I learnt about the McD and Pret collaboration, all alarm bells went on. It’s like a vegan business hooking up with a meat factory to get into a certain market. Red flag right there.
And Pret had to remove the word “natural” from all their marketing after getting slapped by the Advertising Standards Authority … but that’s another story for another day, not to mention Pret selling mouldy food with rat dropping on in 2022, while claiming to “freshly make” years after 2 csutomers died and over 20 got injured which Pret all ignored until it got public, and keep getting away with …
»And when your sun goes down, you’ll know, you’re like everybody else you know.« – Whitey
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I worked at Pret A Manger and survived systemic workplace bullying during bereavement that involved HR, the top leadership, HQ and even the now “retired” former CEO Clive Schlee. I declined 4 settlement offers if I am silent about my ordeal. But I rather speak out to help others. For an overview of important blog entries of my experience with Pret, please visit “My Ordeal with Pret A Manger”. The little arrow to the right next to each heading will lead directly to the post. An incomplete list on what other Pret staff say about Pret’s bullying environment witnessed by customers: Caught in the Act Bullying at Pret. I tell my story for the first time verbally in below audio player interview on a podcast by The Adam Paradox, and wrote two articles in the Scottish Left Review.
I really don’t want to waste a blog post on this guy, but it’s important to show how some people want to be in denial, go against whistleblowers and try all sorts of “tactics” to deny that they don’t care about customer deaths and staff exploitation.
I responded to a tweet that has now been deleted by a Pret customer in Switzerland about Pret opening a new shop there. The person, who on his profile had “Journalist” as well as “Media Personality” stated, said “finally some good sandwiches”.
I replied with a tip to be cautious regarding the “good” sandwiches and posted my blog post with customer complaints on mouldy food etc. all with photo evidence. He then replied with the TYPICAL set of tweets that die-hard Pret fans do. It later turned into silly and also nasty gaslighting, lying, getting his tweets switched that I couldn’t reply anymore.
My response to his now deleted tweet with English translation underneath:
The others who are tweeted in either remained silent or encouraged him to ignore me. Cancel culture as well as enabling behaviour by the book.
Mould, stale bread, rat poo, bugs, flies, hair,plastic in food with photo evidence:
Denial or Tactic #1 – Never happened to “ME”, therefore the problem doesn’t exist:
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“Never happened to me in London” – translated = therefore this problem doesn’t exist (and I don’t care that customers died, and Pret having ignoring it).
My responses are to show further evidence and sharing that in my 10 years in Pret KNOWING Pret from behind the scenes including senior leadership and CEOs, that I’ve seen a lot in Pret. I also link to the customer deaths and so on.
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My tweets can just be followed from above link.
I then tease him saying that he probably doesn’t want Pret to get bad press with all the things I link him to, to which he responds:
I then apologize, which was the mistake, because since then he kept accusing me of offending or attacking him in hopes I would fall for his cheap gaslighting.
The Google translate doesn’t translate well here, I basically said “Of course (not assuming anything). Apoloogies.” etc.
To which I explain again that 1. Pret’s name is still on franchises and Pret THEMSELVES have and continue to screw up in London, UK where Pret are head quartered. And that Pret themselves have ignored TWO customer deaths and over a dozen injuries before it got public. I worked at Pret when people died and wasn’t even told, despite my responsibility having been health & safety.
So, I link him to the two customer deaths in the news on YouTube to have a VISUAL bringing it closer to him, as he is also a father:
Tactic #3 – Sure it’s bad but this would never happen in Switzerland.
“yes bad Clearly. Here in Switzerland, everything is declared everywhere.” = Yes, bad, but that happened way over there in the UK, HERE in perfect Switzerland we have strict food standards.
To which I pointed him AGAIN to a recent customer video from BERLIN, Germany where there are also strict food safety laws, and the video showed how stale the bread is.
I also explained that mouldy food continues to happen in the UK as well as MISLABELLED products where Pret are now breaking the LAW, “Natasha’s Law”.
End of correspondence.
I already packed this tweet exchange away into the past and moved on, when he tweeted the next day a German news article about a woman having bitten into a mouldy McDonald’s product. He now deleted this tweet also, like he deleted his initial “fan” tweet about “good sandwiches” in Pret. But here are my responses to his ridiculous McD comparison.
Tactic #4 – It’s not only Pret, it’s also other businesses, therefore this is “normal” in large chains:
Tactic #5 – Continued gaslighting accusing me of offending and attacking him in hopes I become insecure, while it is HIM that’s insecure like heck:
Just follow the links and click translate otherwise the post gets too long.
I kept asking him to give precise examples where I offended or attacked him. That didn’t come. And by then he could have just blocked me. But instead he switched his replies to me so that I couldn’t reply anymore, while he kept tweeting at me. Very nasty, cowardly and childish behaviour by an adult “journalist” and “media personality” from Switzerland.
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Tactic #6 – SEVERAL things: He deleted information, was embarrassed to behave so poorly while a journalist, then lied he never claimed to be a journo.
DELETED “Journalist” off his profile after I addressed him as a journalist having seen his claim on his profile and asked him to not take things personal. He then lied that he never claimed to have been a journalist and asks me to check his profile where he just deleted “Journalist”. I pointed out to him that I already checked it and that he deleted it off his profile. He now added it again, see screenshots.
What a creep!
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1. Journalist:
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2. The “Journalist” deleted:
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3. Then “Journalist” added again:
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Tactic #7 – Playing dumb asking if I was a bot:
This is then when he started to make all his replies to me “non-repliable” anymore (I just made up that word 😉 ), but he continued to tweet at me. I then blocked him to which he blocked as well. He said that I am an Aldi fan because I gave a metaphor on Aldi vs Lidl to explain his ridiculous comparison between McDonald’s and Pret. I explained that Pret claimed to be fresh and wholesome which McDonald’s never claimed, and that the whole world knows how bad McD is. But Pret was successful in fooling the public for decades.
He then tried to trick me with the Aldi example and then I couldn’t reply anymore. But I replied later via my other account after screenshot some of his tweets before he deleted.
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Unable to reply to his tweets:
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His behaviour is a typical bullying behaviour by the book. And he is enabled by others who pad him on the back.
Tactic #8 – Playing dumb again:
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He received tons of information about my own story as well as customer fatalities and injuries, staff exploitation etc., yet he pretends to not understand what all this was about. Then he deletes his initial tweet and the McDonald’s tweet as he was caught out being indifferent and doesn’t want to be seen as a journalist who is a big fan of Pret.
In a nutshell, this guy was shocked and impressed to have come across so much evidence in how bad Pret really are. Many people respond negatively because they feel shocked and called out to have fallen for Pret. He was so occupied with it that he tweeted the McDonald’s mould issue to me the next day where I was already finished and done with this feed.
But I always respond to anyone and then move on. And I don’t really want to waste a blog post on him, but want to show how SLICK gaslighting, lying, deleting, accusing etc. works in cancel culture.
It’s a shame, because I am more disappointed of people claiming to be journalists than the average Joe who rants on social media.
The last time I came across such a toxic, gaslighting, cowardly person with lofty claims was literally the top Pret senior leadership team. This Gerry guy cowardly switched his tweets so I can’t respond anymore, but kept tweeting at me while I couldn’t respond. Then I blocked him, which I rarely do, so that he can’t continue to tweet while I can’t respond.
I then tweeted my response to him via my other account and now write this blog post and pass this on to his journalism buddies because his and my correspondence are public.
This was TYPICAL denial, cancel culture, trying to manipulate JUST because the person did not want to look objectively at what I presented as huge evidence including customer pictures, news articles, my own experience. THE worst thing that can happen that customers died and Pret IGNORED it has NO meaning to this Gerry guy and his friends. They are bystanders, onlookers and enablers who don’t care except if this would happen to them. Very sad.
And by all means, mute or block me, but to “silence” me and then keep tweeting at me where I can’t respond is COWARDLY. And this is why I call this guy out now.
If this Gerry guy says anything “positive” about his encounter with me in the future, stay away, be cautious, he has lied and played his tricks like an insecure yes-man.
Oh, und Gerry, guck mal wer alles von Twitter weggerannt ist nachdem ich getweeted hab 😉
Du hast noch sehr, sehr viel zu lernen was Pret A Manger betrifft, und ich habe dich jetzt angespornt Pret zu helfen deren Fassade aufrecht zu halten. Ran an die Arbeit, Gerry! Put your name to Pret and STAND behind everything they do, with your name.
I chased Pret RE-founder Julian Metalfe, former Pret CEO Clive Schlee and current CEO Pano Christou off Twitter. And Julian Metcalfe is in Jeffrey Epstein’s address book. Link in the YouTube description.
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I worked at Pret A Manger and survived systemic workplace bullying during bereavement that involved HR, the top leadership, HQ and even the now “retired” former CEO Clive Schlee. I declined 4 settlement offers if I am silent about my ordeal. But I rather speak out to help others. For an overview of important blog entries of my experience with Pret, please visit “My Ordeal with Pret A Manger”. The little arrow to the right next to each heading will lead directly to the post. An incomplete list on what other Pret staff say about Pret’s bullying environment witnessed by customers: Caught in the Act Bullying at Pret. I tell my story for the first time verbally in below audio player interview on a podcast by The Adam Paradox, and wrote two articles in the Scottish Left Review.
I tend to write long blog posts to cover all the basis possible. And I could write the longest blog post yet about loss, but I don’t know where this would go. I have had losses, disappointments, betrayals in my life, like we all have. It’s what makes life a bitch. But I have not known how loss can be a string of things for a long time.
I have yet to speak, either on my podcast or here on my blog, about details regarding my brother’s death. I touched on it here and there but still can’t go into it for fear it would spiral me again into the deepest darkness again. This out-of-control feeling that if there is a hell, this must be part of it, an endless falling into a dark bottomless pit.
I never knew that when you lose a close person, a family member, anyone close to you, that this is the catalyst of many other losses. I heard about it that a loss of a child breaks up a family and the parents often end up divorcing.
For anyone new to my blog or story, I learnt in January 2015 that my brother died 5 weeks prior and was already cremated when we learnt of it. To top it up, I learnt this via an EMAIL! This is how far I can go at this moment, as I can’t cope to go into detail how everything unfolded without falling into this pit again.
To top it up further, I was bullied during this traumatic period of shock and grief in and by Pret A Manger management under the watchful eye of HR and later patronised by former CEO Clive Schlee. I explain this in greater detail on my podcast “expretcast” in 3 episodes. In the audio player on the bottom of this page I didn’t go into the detail of it, but on my podcast with greater hindsight I went to town detailing how Pret targeted me since the beginning.
Three years after my brother died I almost simultaneously lost my job and my dad within months of each other. Pret fired me days after my dad came out of a three-week coma, knowing he was in intensive care. In hindsight, losing a sh!tty job at Pret is nothing to be mourned about. Pret’s head of HR David Carter made me 3 offers of money if I resign, sign a non-disclosure agreement (NDA) to never speak about my ordeal or go to court. I declined the “offer” and was fired. Later when I withdrew my court case against Pret as my dad died, I was made a fourth offer which is normal when withdrawing a tribunal case. I also declined as I didn’t want to lose my voice to speak out what happened.
In-between all this I lost a lot of friends pretty much from the first year as in our society death and loss is still a taboo, as if this would never happen to anyone.
Three years after my dad died my mum died. She died during second lockdown in Germany while I was stuck in London. I couldn’t bury her. Another loss I can’t go into at this time as I can’t cope. I made so many videos of and with my mum when she was still living in her house as I don’t have ANY video of my brother and still regret having deleted all his voice mails from years ago. I still have this problem that I clean up my phone very fast and don’t keep much. That’s why I kept my mum’s voice mails and made videos. But I still can’t look at the videos, even though I assumed I would devour them once she dies. But I can’t look at them at the moment.
Recently a long-time friend died in the USA where I lived for a few years. I didn’t expect to be thrust into a new darkness, as I haven’t seen him since 2013, and only sporadically had email conversations with his wife in-between the years. He was a rare gem of a man who don’t come around much, and I am broken for his wife, who’s equally a gem. I’ve never met a couple like them, which the world needs more of.
I lost my mind, my mental health is screwed up. I was overweight and lost 35-40kg within a year. The first 25kg I lost in the first 6 months after the news of my brother’s death. I had to go shopping 3 or 4 times for clothes as I kept losing weight, never anticipating to “shrink” so fast. EVERYTHING I had to buy new in smaller sizes except socks and shoes.
Some say that this is a good thing that came out of the loss of my brother. Sure, in a certain way there are always “good” things that can come from trauma and loss. But the weight loss was so rapid, as I couldn’t eat, even though I had free lunch food at Pret, that it brought upon other health issues. Rapid weight loss isn’t healthy either. I am grateful I rather lost than gained weight, as my dad was the total opposite. After my brother’s death, he gained weight and comfort ate while I couldn’t even swallow. But yes, having gone back to my original weight I grew up with is a plus as I can walk up stairs without pain in my joints and shortness of breath. Or I can buy clothes again whereas while overweight rarely found what I liked in my size. But I’d rather weigh like an elephant and have my brother back.
I lost support. I lost opportunities. I am a few steps closer to understand how people can lose their homes and end up on the street due to alcohol or drug issues after a traumatic experience.
I still struggle with drinking although it has become much better.
Receiving the news of my brother’s death via email and then also being bullied in Pret by a line manager via group emails, as well as Lila Warren who was tasked to give me a disciplinary for emailing Pret so much, she then later ALSO started to communicate with me via text message and email in private for which she disciplined me in the first place. has fucked me up so much that I started to write thousands upon thousands of emails to EVERYBODY! I also struggle then when I tweet sh!t to people while drunk.
There is no excuse, I looked into getting a time-lock safe but haven’t gotten it yet. That’s completely my fault and responsibility.
I have almost lost my life in close calls to jump … and know we will all lose our lives one day.
I still want to look into researching and maybe writing about our society’s and culture’s approach to death, loss and grief. I have experienced so much sh!t in the last 7+ years that I don’t know which book to write first or if to write a series of books combining a lot of the things I went through. But I’m tired of writing.
I called into a BBC radio show in the early morning of Christmas Day 2019 where I briefly touched on how we in our society today handle grief and loss. Of course now since the pandemic and more wars this subject has become more “accessible”, and even on the radio I hear more and more that this theme is popping up.
In my experiences the last 7 years I have sabotaged a lot of opportunities and friendships. Apart from PTSD, I also think I do this partly out of guilt not having responded to my brother’s email which ended up being his last. Why should I have a good life while he is dead is the emotion I often felt. Sibling survivor guilt, fear of losing friends again when a tragedy hit. The friends that left me hang early on, I didn’t deserve it. But I deserve it now. I push everyone away now so I have nothing left to lose.
As I said, screwed up. And before you judge, check my podcast episode on my NHS mental health service ordeal. I asked at one point if I have some form of autism, and a brief questionaire was started by a psychologist where it was mentioned that I cover some points, but no further assessment. I gave up.
In a nutshell, one major loss is often the catalyst of a string of losses, it certainly was in my case. And where this goes from here, I’m not concerned anymore.
And again, my apologies to all and everyone I offended, hurt and upset. After such a long time, I have no excuse.
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I worked at Pret A Manger and survived systemic workplace bullying during bereavement that involved HR, the top leadership, HQ and even the now “retired” former CEO Clive Schlee. I declined 4 settlement offers if I am silent about my ordeal. But I rather speak out to help others. For an overview of important blog entries of my experience with Pret, please visit “My Ordeal with Pret A Manger”. The little arrow to the right next to each heading will lead directly to the post. An incomplete list on what other Pret staff say about Pret’s bullying environment witnessed by customers: Caught in the Act Bullying at Pret. I tell my story for the first time verbally in below audio player interview on a podcast by The Adam Paradox, and wrote two articles in the Scottish Left Review.
