This place is like family - Associate Design Director Grow (VA) Employee Review

Great culture, benefits, and location.

Lack of upward career movement.

Rad office on a cool street. Snack. Occasional catered lunches. Talented and friendly employees.

I learned an important life lesson during my time at Grow: never work for a company with a single owner. I quickly discovered that Drew's vanity, pursuit of perfection, and extreme micro-management style stifled creativity, exacerbated strategy and undermined morale (another review politely called this a "managerial bottleneck"). There was a lack of trust that made me question why I was hired in the first place. Most of the people who worked there were locals who hadn't ventured outside Virginia. The out-of-state hires rarely stay longer than a year. Grow's portfolio has some big brands, but keep in mind, most of that is banner ad-based work. They had an ArtCopyCode retainer with Google but I never saw repeat business. The studio's location and lack of emphasis on in-person work sessions made building client relationships nearly impossible. My closing thought: when the CEO of your company tells you to move a banner ad button "1 pixel to the right", you know they're focusing on the wrong things.