Shortly after our store opened nearly two years ago, during a truck unload process our team leader handed an employee who had worked especially hard an old garden rock and said, “You rock!” to recognize his great contribution.

It was just a joke then, but over time the “You Rock!” award has been developed into a coveted honor – not only because an employee is getting recognized by his or her peers,  but because it’s a fun celebration for the whole team!

Each week the previous recipient selects their successor based on their overall attitude, peer coaching, communication, and energy during the truck unload process. We try and relate each winner’s performance to one of our Foundation Principles.

After the novelty became tradition, the original rock was painted with the words “You Rock!” and a poster was created to display photos of the weekly winners. At the end of the month the winners are entered into a drawing and one person is chosen to receive a FREE The Container Store T-shirt. The rock has proven to be a great motivating and team building tool and has generated an award the group looks forward to each week!

-    Lisa R., General Manager, Indianapolis Store

I officially celebrated my 20^th anniversary with the company in 2011, but at the time my husband Mike and I did not feel it was the right time for us to take a fun trip, as our youngest son Rusty was serving in the Marines, stationed in Afghanistan.

The Container Store graciously allowed us to postpone our trip to a more appropriate time and we have just returned from a seven day Hawaiian cruise!  We experienced everything we had dreamed of as we cruised between the four major Hawaiian Islands.

We took a helicopter tour of the live volcanoes, went whale watching, toured Pearl Harbor, and watched the surfers on the Banzai Pipeline … all things that we had wanted to do for years.

This is one of many reasons why I feel lucky every day to work for The Container Store!

-       Peggy S., Area Director, 20+ years

Our customers are always impressed by the fun, friendly atmosphere within the stores and it’s because we love our jobs. Colleagues also become family and family becomes colleagues – literally! After a few years of working at The Container Store, I recruited my husband Vernon to work here too. His positions have changed over the years, but he’s always been in the Distribution Center and is the only employee in the DC with a 12-year perfect attendance record! So, it was extra special for us to get to go on my 20-year tenure trip together.

For my trip, I chose to see the beauty and wonder of Alaska on a week-long luxury cruise ship with exciting excursions in mainland ports. Alaska is amazing. Every port was full of new and exciting adventures. Our first tour outside of Juneau was river rafting (white water rapids included) off the Mendenhall Glacier. For a couple of southerners, that 37 degree water was cold!

The next day we went to Skagway and took the White Pass & Yukon Route train to the Canadian border where we discovered some of the most beautiful scenery we have even seen. Then we arrived at Glacier Bay the following day and were awed by the beauty and grandeur of the glaciers, which were taller than our ship and went on for miles back into the mountain range. The air was so clean and refreshing. We witnessed the calving off of the glacier face, which was the highlight of our trip.

Another fun excursion was zip-lining through the forest outside of Ketchikan where from the top of the trees we could see for miles. The forests were so green and lush that it is hard to believe that this part of the world could be so spectacular given the harsh winters. This trip was more wonderful than we could have ever imagined!

What makes The Container Store so special? I have been with the company for 21+ years and from my first interview I knew The Container Store would be a home for me. It’s the people who start out as co-workers or bosses and become friends and mentors. It is the people who, though caring and leadership helped me learn lessons that became valuable in both my professional and personal life.  I’m so proud to be a part of this family!

-       Cheryl S., Fort Worth Store, 20+ years

It is truly an honor for The Container Store to be recognized as one of the Top Workplaces in Los Angeles! We’ve been in the LA market since 2004 and now have three locations (Pasadena, Century City and El Segundo).  Our employees make The Container Store a great place to work and with their talents and intuition, we are able to provide a matchless customer experience.

This honor is both humbling and exciting, because of how diligently we work to create a workplace that is rewarding and stimulating for our employees.  We strive to motivate and uplift one another, in order for the entire store to be successful.  We treat each other with kindness and compassion.  As our President, Melissa Reiff always says, “We must practice consistent, reliable, predictable, effective, thoughtful, courteous and compassionate communication every single day to successfully sustain, develop and grow our business.”

I’m proud to be a part of the Los Angeles community, and the community that is The Container Store.

- Richard, Store Manager – Sales/Training, El Segundo Store, 3 years

Chad and his colleagues from Arnold Palmer Medical Center with our Chief Merchant, Sharon Tindell and our president, Melissa Reiff, at the Orlando Store Grand Opening Preview Party.

When we opened Arnold Palmer Medical Center in 1989, one piece of advice from our namesake, Arnold Palmer, which we clung to that day was “Good will never be good enough.”  This motivation has carried us for almost 25 years and was the driving force behind the opening of Winnie Palmer Hospital for Women & Babies in 2006.  Winnie Palmer Hospital was built on the principle that it would never look or feel like a hospital, that women could have their healthcare needs provided in a place that more closely resembled a 5-star hotel than a hospital, and that above all how you provide the service is ultimately what matters.

When The Container Store contacted us about partnering with them for the grand opening of their Orlando store, we knew that this would be a perfect match.  Both of our companies pride themselves not only on the products or services we provide, but also what the customer experiences during that encounter.  We knew that as much as the women of Orlando had an affinity for Winnie Palmer Hospital, they had an equal affinity for The Container Store and the organization the store brings to their busy lives.

Over the past six months, we have been proud to partner with The Container Store.  From promotions to parties, all of the Winnie Palmer Hospital family has been excited to participate alongside one of the best corporate community partners in America.  See photos from The Container Store’s Orlando Grand Opening Weekend here. 

Now, with the first customer through The Container Store’s door and many more thousands that shopped during the opening weekend, we are very honored to have received a donation of $21,000 from our partner – 10% of their grand opening weekend sales!

These funds will go towards the expansion of our Neonatal Intensive Care Unit.  This unit gives the blessing of hope and healing to our tiniest babies.  Each year the NICU provides care for over 1,200 babies and with our expansion, the NICU will be able to care for 142 babies at once, and will be the largest unit in country.

We are so thankful for this opportunity and grateful for The Container Store choosing to support the needs of the women and children we serve every day.  With their support, we will continue on our journey of “Good never being good enough.”

- Chad Phillips, Foundation Vice President, Arnold Palmer Medical Center

Our Inventory Coordinator team in our Distribution Center is responsible for keeping track of our product inventory. Ensuring we have the right product in the right place at the right time for our customers makes us a very busy bunch! In order to better serve our stores and our customers, our team recently split into a daytime and evening shift. Since we’re now not always physically together, we decided to start using our monthly team meetings as time for team building and reconnecting.

Each month, we select a different fun team-building activity that gets us laughing, and reminds us why we’ve chosen to be a part of this rewarding, exciting team. During the holidays, we each selected a Christmas ornament and described which characteristics of a leader it represented to us, and why.

In another meeting, two of our team members created a word game scavenger hunt. We all put on fun hats (to increase our Air of Excitement!), separated into groups, and looked for clues around the Distribution Center to find hidden words such as “heart” or “listening.” When we re-grouped, we talked about what those words meant to us.

I think the meetings truly serve to bring us together as a team and to remind us to have fun in our jobs. Leadership at The Container Store is about working with people, not working above them. A smile and a sense of humor is essential in all job roles and that’s what we work to bring to each other every single day!

-       Lisa W., Distribution Center Inventory Coordinator, 2 ½ years 

But what we love most about Eagle Creek is that their company stands for many of the same things that we do – including putting employees first, inspiring them, and ensuring that they have fun and fulfilling careers. Hear directly from Gabe Artalejo, Eagle Creek National Sales Manager, about why he feels The Container Store and Eagle Creek are perfect partners!

Stacy, an 8-year employee, said that her life’s JOURNEY brought her to The Container Store where her career allows her to pursue her passion for traveling. She loves that her travels for our company empower her to create an incredible wake — WAKE like a boat’s wake — in her family’s, friends’, community’s and co-workers’ lives. I adore that Stacy’s passion for travel has aligned itself with the needs of our business in order to create a wonderfully fulfilling career for her and an indelible contribution to each of our new stores and new employees as she helps them prepare for Grand Opening Day!

We take it seriously that our employees choose to spend much of their life’s journey with us. We’re honored that our customers invite us to share theirs. And we’re humbled that our partnership in our vendors’ journey to build their businesses has in many cases meant growing from operating out of their garages to successful manufacturing facilities. When everyone connected to our business is happy and well cared for, it creates a more enjoyable journey for all.

But it all starts with our employees. It’s our number one priority to ensure that our employees are thriving in their careers and truly understand our deep-rooted appreciation for all they do to make The Container Store a company our customers are excited to support.

So, we delight in recognizing our 10-year employees with two extra weeks of vacation as a paid sabbatical. And at 20 years of service, we provide them with two round-trip airline tickets anywhere in the U.S., an extra week of vacation and $1,000 spending money. These adventures, without a doubt, enhance our employees’ lives and add to their life experiences. Those experiences in turn help our customers organize a kid’s room, an overflowing closet, or during this time of year, a perfectly packed suitcase for an organized and stress-free journey across the state, country or globe.

We can’t wait to hear about your next journey, weekend jaunt or jet-setting adventure — be sure to leave a comment telling us all about it for a chance to win one of the many $50 Store More Cards we give away each month.

— Kip Tindell, Chairman and CEO

For the spring semester I have been lucky to be a part of the Dallas Study Tour class at UNT. This class gives us the opportunity to visit corporate offices of many popular retailers in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. Not only are we making connections, but we are also getting to learn about many different types of businesses that operate in our Metroplex. Recently, our class took a trip to The Container Store home office in Coppell, Texas and had an amazing time!

Not only did we get to hear about the fun company culture, take a tour of the offices and distribution center, and learn about the company’s core values, but we were lucky enough to meet and talk to the CEO, Kip Tindell. He discussed the wake a person has, or the power a person has no matter the role they play in a company. Along with this idea he shared that the more an organization understands their power, the more conscious they are of what is going on. I learned so much from Kip in the time we were able to speak with him in his office, and it was an amazing experience to gain insight from the leader of one of the top retailers in the nation!

UNT Students speak with The Container Store’s Chairman and CEO, Kip, in his office.

Throughout the trip, I was very impressed with the environment and enthusiasm of all the employees, and the respect everyone has for each other is remarkable. I was very inspired by the company culture and the home office itself, it looked like an exciting work environment that anyone could thrive in. The use of color and The Container Store product as art stimulates excitement for employees and really shows where the passion lies in the business. I truly valued what everyone had to share in our presentation, and connected most with the emphasis put on the importance of communication. Through my own experience, I have learned communication is key in retail and to hear this from leaders in the business was very rewarding. I also connected with the company’s core values and was excited to see employees so passionate to follow through with every principle that keeps the company alive.

Overall, our trip to The Container Store was very gratifying and fun. This trip broadened my perspective on the many retailers that are operating today, and the environment made me excited for a fun, yet rewarding career in the industry.

-    Rachael Kennedy, University of North Texas Student

Kip speaking to a group of students at the National Retail Federation Foundation’s “Retail’s Big Show.”

I’ve always felt that a college education is a true gift – a gift of knowledge and life experience. And since 1978, we’ve worked hard to give parents and their college-bound kids the gift of organization during this often stressful transition to smaller living spaces, increased workloads and complex scheduling. We know that when students start out organized it makes future responsibilities, time commitments and the juggle of daily life much easier. One student who is putting those skills to use is Allie Miller, last year’s recipient of The Container Store – Mona Williams – Women Making a Difference in Retail Scholarship at Texas A&M University. This endowment was created as a tribute to our Vice President of Buying, Mona Williams.

She was one of our most beloved leaders who unexpectedly passed away in 2010, but whose 30-year contributions to our company will never be forgotten. While it gives a female student the gift of financial support to pursue a career in retail, it also recognizes the female leadership throughout our company. I’m proud that 14 of our 18 top leaders are women and that nearly 2/3 of our employees are female. The scholarship is also funded by many generous contributions from our vendor partners who loved and adored working with Mona as much as we did. And it celebrates what we know a career in retail can mean – endless opportunity, creativity and innovation. There are the products, the merchandising, the marketing, the logistics, the technology, the vendor partnerships and of course, the people – the wonderfully talented and smart people. I can’t think of an industry in which I would rather spend my career! I sincerely believe that a career in retail is the greatest profession of all.

University of North Texas retailing students visit The Container Store’s headquarters.

To learn more about this scholarship and our focus on ensuring the best and brightest students consider retail as a career, read some of our recent posts on the subject, including:

• “Reflections from our Mona Williams Scholarship Winner”
• “From Architecture to Retail”
• “Retail’s Got What Millennials Want” 

–Kip Tindell, Chairman and CEO

Outstanding student Allie Miller was honored last year as the first-ever recipient of the scholarship. She was chosen based on a review of her resume, work experience, campus involvement, leadership, GPA, and an essay outlining her career aspirations and merit for the scholarship. We’re excited to be working with the Texas A&M Center for Retailing Studies to select our 2013 scholarship winner, so be on the lookout for more info about our next recipient!

Allie Miller, our inaugural scholarship recipient, with Mona’s husband, Marty Williams.

In the meantime, we wanted to share Allie’s reflections on how the scholarship has provided her with great opportunity over the past year:

“I feel like it was just yesterday that I was sitting at home when I received the call from Brooke Minteer at The Container Store informing me that I was going to be the Mona Williams scholarship recipient. It is hard to believe that a whole year has flown by! These last 12 months have brought great challenges, hardships, and success for me. Some of the highlights include being named the 2013-2014 Student Retailing President and working on two case competitions– The YMA Fashion Scholarship Fund and Stanley Marcus Competition. It has been so exciting being an upperclassmen and having more “hands-on” merchandising experience through my Marketing courses.

The Mona Williams Scholarship is such an amazing gift that helped me focus on my schoolwork and less on the financial burden that comes with being a student. Moreover, I am even more grateful for the relationships that came, as an added bonus, with the scholarship. I will always remember visiting The Container Store’s corporate office and meeting many incredible people. The Container Store employees have all impacted me greatly and I am looking forward to continually seeking out their advice and friendship. I am immensely blessed to be the first of many Aggies to experience this scholarship.

As I finish up my junior year, I have several big decisions to make, but I am anxious to begin interning and preparing for my last year at Texas A&M.  Thank you again to The Container Store for being such a huge part of my college experience!”

-       Allie Miller, Mona Williams – Women Making a Difference in Retail Scholarship Winner 

On the NRF’s “Retail’s Big Blog, executive director of the NRF Foundation, Ellen Davis, speaks to millennials, sharing that retail has what YOU’RE looking for in a career – you just might not know it yet!

The NRF’s campaign echos what we’ve felt at The Container Store for years – that a career in retail offers more growth, innovation, and ability to give back than any other industry. Retail supports 42 million American jobs – and they’re not all behind a cash register.

According to the NRF’s site, retailers hire more finance employees than Wall Street; more engineers than Silicon Valley; and a whole lot of creative minds like photographers, web designers, marketers and writers? Career opportunities within the retail industry are endless!

Also, don’t miss the incredible videos showing firsthand what retail can REALLY offer to a young person starting his or her career – watch them at www.thisisretail.org.

Here at The Container Store, we support this campaign 100%. It’s our mission to ensure that the best and brightest students consider a career in retail. We partner with local universities to bring retailing students in for tours of our offices; we fund scholarships; we speak to student groups; and we hire many college students to work in our stores and encourage them to stay with us long after they’ve graduated! THAT is retail and we love it!

As we were setting up the new shelves, with much appreciated help from our Installation Services, we were able to witness the reactions of many wide-eyed preschoolers as they came in through the front doors for their first visit.  It was just so rewarding to be able to volunteer for an organization that’s so prominent and impactful in our local community!

- Mark B., Store Manager – Sales & Training, Westbury Store, 1 year

Many of us here at The Container Store have had the privilege of meeting Bert Jacobs when he spoke to us at our annual Staff Meeting. He’s the co-founder and Chief Executive Optimist of the wonderful apparel company Life is good – as well as a Boston native.

When we heard that Bert and our friends at Life is good were donating 100% of profits from their Boston Love Tee to The One Fund Boston to honor the people lost, injured and impacted by the tragic events surrounding the Boston Marathon, we wanted to help and know you will, too! They’re $26.20 – the same number of miles as a marathon.

We so agree with Life is good that NOTHING is stronger than LOVE. Please consider helping the Boston community heal by purchasing a tee now.

Of course as soon as the news broke, I immediately heard from my “TCS family” with well wishes, and expressions of concern wondering how they might help. Having worked at The Container Store for 16 years, I’ve been so lucky to be surrounded by positive, smart, roll-up-your-sleeves, get-it-done kind of colleagues. Great people with a lot of pride for their company – much like the folks in the tiny, central Texas town of West. So, before I could almost blink away the tears in my eyes – our team was already springing into action and ready to help in the most immediate, useful way possible.

Over the past few days we have sent trucks down to deliver product to the residents in West who are slowly recovering what is left of their homes, and to the schools that were damaged and destroyed.  The Container Store partnered with our wonderful product vendors, Iris USA and Sterilite, to donate more than 2,500 storage totes. We also worked with our vendor Pratt Industries to donate more than 3,000 corrugated boxes, as well as 3M to donate 600 rolls of packing tape.

To see my sweet, wonderful colleague Vic Y. – a 20 year employee of The Container Store who drove the trucks down – greet my dear, best friend since fifth grade, Missy Sulak, was so touching – like family meeting family.  And to see the gratitude of those most affected and get a hug from them was something I’ll never forget.  These “boxes” were bigger than just that – they would store and protect what was left of these precious folks’ lives.

Our wonderful employee Vic Y. arriving in our What We Stand For truck to deliver the boxes!

I’m so lucky to get to see our Foundation Principles and Conscious Capitalism at work every day in my job, but this generous gesture of our employees, vendors and community coming together for a town small in size but big in spirit was amazing.

I know my beloved West will rebuild into an even stronger, wonderful community. And it’s times like these at The Container Store that we become even closer and connected. I’m so fortunate to get to call both places my home.

For more ways to donate to the community of West, please contact the American Red Cross or donate directly via relief accounts set up at local West, TX, banks including www.snbwest.com or www.pointwestbank.com.

- Casey S., Vice President of Public Relations and Marketing Communications, 16 years 

Here’s what two of our Prime-Time Indianapolis employees had to say about the honor, after attending the local Awards Breakfast held for the recipients – so proud!:

“As a member of The Container Store team, I’ve found a truly unique corporate philosophy that is foreign to most work environments and almost non-existent from the retail world. Driven by the leadership team, that philosophy is mostly to credit for The Container Store’s long-lasting presence on FORTUNE Magazine’s list of “100 Best Companies to Work For” (a span of 14 years!), as well as locally on this list.

How fortunate I feel to have been (literally) at the table representing the rest of my amazing team members during that awards ceremony. Thank you, The Container Store, for this experience and the many other Exceptional Benefits I receive as a part of the simple decision to join the family.”

- Sara R., Prime-Time Employee, Indianapolis Store

Prime-time employee Deborah S. (left), accepts the Indianapolis Top Workplaces award with General Manager Lisa R.

“What an honor and pleasure it was, to attend the “Indianapolis Star Top Work Places 2013,” awards breakfast! I felt quite proud to be with three of my colleagues, representing the entire team. As we all enjoyed a delicious breakfast, I was elated to realize we were in the company of many important Central Indiana business organizations, both large and small. And when I realized The Container Store was the only retail business represented on the top 40 “Small Companies” list, I was so excited…another HUGE CELEBRATION!!! Being selected as a top workplace allows our company to stand out and be recognized with respect, in the business community and also attracts great employees. The trickledown effect…customers want to do business with great companies, which, in turn, leads to growth. We have so much to appreciate and be proud of!! CONGRATULATIONS to all of us, at The Container Store Indianapolis!!!!”

– Deborah S., Prime-Time Employee, Indianapolis Store

Our Kitchen and Food Storage Buyer Kim K. leads our new Tampa team through Buyer Training.

Did you ever wonder how our employees just seem to know EVERYTHING about ALL of our products and always have the PERFECT solution for the toughest organizational challenges?

Well, it’s all about the training! Before we open a new store, our newly-hired employees experience an entire month of training on all of our products, store systems, our Foundation Principles, and more. This allows them to be fully prepared before they hit the sales floor!

One of our new store employees’ FAVORITE trainings is “Buyer Training” – an incredible 8-hour day of in-store training led by The Container Store’s buying team.  Our buyers take the new team aisle by aisle through our store explaining why they chose to carry each product, and any surprising or unique aspects about it.

All day long, employees are gasping with surprise, exclaiming with excitement and writing down products that they just HAVE to buy for themselves now that they know all that the product can do. It’s so much fun!

Here are a few incredible tips and tidbits from the training…

• The Container Store’s tubular hangers are unique – we worked with our fabulous vendor to create special molds that don’t have the sharp ridge on the plastic that others do, which protects clothing from rips and tears. Plus, we offer a dozen fun colors to choose from!

• We have the perfect solution for people who love to eat pickles, artichokes, and other items packed in juice – round plastic food storage containers with a built-in strainer, to keep your fingers dry!

• We actually worked alongside our vendor to design our 12 gallon stainless steel step cans, which are exclusive to The Container Store! The cool thing about these – a removable plastic liner makes bag changes super easy, and features technology that keeps the trash bag in place, resulting in less mess.

• If you need a smart way to keep laundry sorted, our rhombus hamper is designed with magnets sewed into the sides so you can connect multiples together.

• For your on-the-go Office needs, our portable accordion files expand fully at both the top and the bottom to provide ample storage space for your documents.

Our new store teams leave the training feeling empowered, in-the-know, and most of all, excited about helping customers with anything and everything they need! We always say that our employees “sell the hard stuff”- products that have more functionality than meets the eye – and this is how we do it! It takes highly trained, knowledgeable and caring employees to assist our customers and provide exceptional customer service.

Jeff G. (right) with fellow employees at the weekly “Weight Watchers at Work” meeting.

I have always thought that the company offers a great array of benefits that fit the health and wellness category, but I have to admit, aside from actively promoting them to our Distribution Center team, I often find myself falling short when it comes to full participation.

That all changed for me recently and I am now celebrating a great positive improvement in my health. In January, the offer was made to all Home Office and Distribution Center employees to join “Weight Watchers at Work.” Not only are the weekly meetings held here on site, but the company picks up 50% of the cost for those that meet a participation goal. I’m just 12 weeks in and I have lost over 14% of my body weight and am feeling fantastic! Now that’s what I call a special and unique benefit!

To-date, our “Weight Watchers at Work” participants have collectively lost a total of 630 pounds!! Wow! I’m so proud to be a part of this group of employees who have committed to living a healthier lifestyle.

-       Jeff G., Distribution Manager – Evening Shift, 14 years