Collegeworks reviews

1434940630

Max McMahon

google

1

I am a former Branch Manager and am also a former District Manager who has gone through and completed the program, so what I am trying to say is that I know this company inside and out. This is the only review that you need to read because I am going to tell you the truth about interning for College Works. READ THIS ALL THE WAY THROUGH!!! My intern year was a disaster, the spring was easy, the summer was a nightmare. I interview, hired, and employed over 20 painters in the four months that I ran production and ended up with zero employees by mid August. I had a terrible customer service rating due to the lack of training that my painters had since they were constantly being replaced and retrained. The time frame it took to finish a simple house was almost always double than predicted, which then lead to an incredibly low profitability of 11% which is less than half of what the anticipated profit margin is for an intern. By about mid June, I was working side by side with my painters and was still behind budget on every single job that was produced. I am not exaggerating when I say this, I spent 100 hours a week running my business at that time, whether it was time spent on a job site, doing sales calls, driving to and from clients homes and the paint stores, time spent on the phone with my district manager, and so on and so forth. By July I had just about given up on myself, I was sleep deprived, exhausted, depressed, and sick from the poor nutrition and lack of rest and I was flat broke. The month of August was virtually no different than July other than the fact that I had no painters and painted houses alone. I painted houses during the school year while also recruiting interns out of NIU. I would work 20 hours on the weekends painting houses and would also work during the week in between classes, driving 4 hours a day so that I would be able to paint for 6 hours and attend class for 2 more hours during the same day. I finished painting houses on October 24th of 2014. I had started painting in late May and had only produced $60,000. My time as a district manager is what you really need to read about. The District Managers at the company are not bad people, some of them are my closest friends. But we had all been bombarded with CWP's constant propaganda that keeps people so blinded and sucked into the company that we were almost unable to think for ourselves. The VP's at College Works are unimaginably persuasive and are able to convince interns and District Managers that this internship is their lucky break and they HAVE to do this program. The company is almost cult-like in nature, with everyone so convinced that they are the lucky ones, and that even though their parents, friends, and family keep telling you that this isn't good for them, you will not listen. The DM's will sit down with and work you over, make any little connection they can between your major and hopeful future and spin it in a way that will convince you that you NEED to do this internship, regardless of how it may actually benefit you. I am guilty of this. I was so invested in the company that I really believed that these perfect strangers, who I had known for less than a half hour, did need to do this. I roped in anyone who showed interest, whether or not it was right for them. First training rolled around in January and I had thrown away my academic scholarships because they told me that no one cared about my education or how well I did in school as long as I graduated and got work experience from them. Then they fired me. They said thank you for your service, you worked hard but we don't think you should do this, try working as an intern again. After that I finally got some sense knocked into me and I left and never looked back. You will most likely be part of the 80% of interns who are hired who quit or make less than the average $10,000 that they entice you with, but if you still think you are up for the internship, here's what I liked, I made friends, got good at interviews and most importantly, I learned how to spot a scam.

1483816875

Larry Storch

google

1

I feel they are a SCAM! Bellingham, WA operations.

1443238182

Holly Watson

google

5

Giovanna Graciani and her crew painted our house this summer. We were very pleased with Giovanna's oversight of her team, the quality of the job and most importantly, Giovanna's help with paint selection. We love how our house turned out. Many compliments from neighbors! Thank you Giovanna and your team.

1437521912

Wayne Stoddard

google

5

Richard Jo saved the day and the assignment! A few schedule conflicts came up and we were able to work through these and keep to the original schedule! From what I can tell Richard was able to work with College Works scheduling and get my job back on the right track! Without his involvement and dedication to preserve customer satisfaction, the whole experience would have been pretty negative...but he saved the day, as I indicated above. He and Albert worked till darkness, on several days, to push ahead and be sure that a quality job would be the result, and meet a deadline. This team I would recommend to anyone! They are very dedicated to doing a great job, and not cutting corners. They cover all the little things, and make recommendations, point out issues, do extra work to be sure that their efforts will be recognized by the customer! I can't say enough about Richard and would completely recommend him to any new customer!!!

1572031655

Brian Blonski

google

We apologize for any inconvenience we may have caused. We strive for 100% customer satisfaction and are sorry to say we fell short of that while working on your project. Please feel free to contact our corporate office if you have any further concerns. We can be reached at 888-450-9675. Thank you, College Works Painting

1573661996

2

They took 3 months to schedule the painting instead of the promised 3 weeks. Ultimately they just subcontract to some independent painter and take a cut. Later I found they were overpriced. Really they're just a high pressure marketing company. Better to contact a local painter directly.