So this is how it works, the store
shelves are all roughly eight feet tall and they have a set of shelves on top
that we call the “Top Deck.” The Top Deck is where you would keep all the extra
stock to refill in the shelves as the customers by stuff throughout the day.
Most of the back stock is not kept “in the back” like most people think. It is
kept within relative proximity to the item on the shelf itself.
Then you get a crew of three. One is
on the large wheeled ladder and he is calling out what items he has on the top
deck. The two people underneath call out how many they need and it gets dropped
down to them. The shelf is stocked and customers are happy because the store
looks full.
Running the top decks was typically
the responsibility of the night crew. Since time is one of the things that we
have an overabundance of, we have still been “stocking” the store on a regular
basis. We all go through and stock the store on Fridays to replace all the
things that we use throughout the week. The theory is that we work really hard
on Friday to justify our more relaxed attitude on the weekends. (We have found
it is far too easy to forget what day it is so we always try to convey a
different “weekend” feeling.)
I know this seems like a tedious chore
but when you have twenty people working on things, split into teams and
dividing up the work, it is over in an hour. Whenever we first started doing
this, it took a considerable amount of time to go through everything. That was
back in May. Now that we are into November, the stock levels continue to
dwindle and as we are condensing shelves and combining aisles together, many of
the top decks are getting emptied out.
“A” Side includes cereal, canned
vegetables, baking goods, and juice. Obviously those sides have emptied out
much faster than 5B which is your detergent and dishwashing supplies or 6B
which is your pet supplies. Kilo eats like a freaking king but it would take
him ten years to consume half of the dog food bags that we have on hand. (That
is if he was eating dry food. Alex spoils him with all the canned food.)
Running the top decks and moving
things out from the back room and managing all the HBC items has now become so
routine, everyone knows that this is what we do on Fridays. I know to an
outsider looking in, these kinds of routines can seem pointless and in the long
run, I would agree. But here are my justifications for doing this.
1) It gives everyone something to do
and I think those kinds of distractions are a good thing. We all pitch in and
work together to get things done.
2) It gives us an accurate count of
how quickly we are burning through our stock levels and if we need to slow down
and ration or in the case of dated product, hurry up and eat.
3) It lets everyone work together. It
helps us keep an eye on one another and make sure no one is cracking up. It is
work but it is also motivation. And when it starts to get cold and we have to
button up, we are going to need motivation.
Getting
to work…
