Anybody have tips on how to throw faster? I usually do the nonfood side of grocery (pet, laundry, paper, baby). We have to go straight off the pallet, no spotting. We usually spot some stuff , but right off the.pallet for the most part.
I use the big boxes of paper to hold my trash. Anybody have any words of wisdom? I'm pretty much at 50 cpm (but its hard to say since I can't case-count myself)
Yea use a box for trash, try to get an available cart to throw any backstock on. Decide when you do and don't need to use the boxcutter. Some boxes have a ton of tape, but if it's a simpler box then just use your bare hands to open it and crush it.
Yup, I am having the same problem except I have been with Kroger for over 6 years on night stock. I used to think I was fast! I transferred to another store as full time. The volume at my new store is double what I am used to. My aisle is the canned veggies, soup, fruit, beans, ravioli, tomatoes, tuna, gravy, ramen noodles, broth, hamburger helper, betty crocker potatoes and dry beans/rice aisle.
Please, someone let me know this is the most challenging aisle in the store! I am getting my butt kicked at the moment.
My first night was 400 cases! I will literally spend every shift and the entire shift in that aisle.
I crunched the DDP numbers. There is too much work there for one average person at the moment.
I usually spot the paper aisle and then start at one end of the aisle and use the pallet to pick up trash and backstock and condition as I go. I use the paper towel boxes for carboard. If you can not spot, then I would leave carboard on the floor when it is empty. When the pallet is ran, go back and pick up cardboard.
In the soap aisle, I run off pallet leaving cardboard on floor. Most of the boxes in that aisle are not worth breaking down. On my way out of aisle, I put cardboard on pallet and take it to baler. Then, go back and condition.
In the catfood aisle, I spot everything that is packaged in cases. Run the bags of dogfood. Get rid of empty pallet. Then, I condition entire aisle while running spotted products. I use shopping cart for cardboard. I cut all plastic off of catfood cans at the same time, then run them. For a peyton truck, most of the product is dog treats so it might be easier to run off of pallet.
I have never run the baby aisle. It was usually 5-15 cases on the grocery truck. Drug/GM ran that aisle.
What state are you in?
How are you calculating your 50 cph? Just running cases? Or, running cases and conditioning?
How long have you been on nights?
Who counts the cases for you? If you are concerned about case count, I suggest you get yourself a counter and keep track.
Warehouses in this area pay about $15 an hourdouble Kroger's starting wagefor that kind of constant nads-to-the-wall, high-pressure work.
I worked in a grocery warehouse 20 years ago. They count numbers too. The runs were supposed to be random but I always got stuck with the huge military orders.
A military order would be 400 cases and I would have 1 hour and 45 minutes to select everything in the 10 acre warehouse. A small mom and pop store would be 15 cases and I would get 25 minutes to select that order. I always had to get to work early so I could get a good machine. Most of them were crap.
I have heard from the drivers that there is a high turn over rate at the warehouse. The pallets will arrive at kroger looking half decent for a few months. And, then they will look like crap and fall over. I imagine those were from the new hires.
The same old repetition. The more you do the aisles, the more you know where everything is, the quicker you can find where things go and throw them up quicker.
. . . worked in a grocery warehouse 20 years ago. They count numbers too.
. . . I always had to get to work early so I could get a good machine. Most of them were crap.
I have heard from the drivers that there is a high turn over rate at the warehouse. . . .
I was there 2010-2013, and the story is both familiar, yet maybe worse. "Engineered standards"--times based on the rosiest scenarios (jacks that work; aisles that aren't blocked)--is the name of the latest electronic lash.
Company-wide, seven employees were killed at work in a three-year period.
In Texas, workers have zero protection from forced overtime. At 1159 hours Wednesday, management can and do tell the worker he'll be back tomorrow . . . even if Thursday is his scheduled day off. If he wanted to visit his grandmother's bedside or needed to grease the chassis of his Toyota, too bad.
So, I don't recommend it; it's just if someone is facing that kind of pressure for similar work inside a Kroger store, there are higher wages to be had.
At Ralphs on the West coast, 50 cases makes you a star. Most of us who are in our late 50.s maybe does 25 tops. We are paid well, so we dont retire, and pohsically we are all messed up after 40 years in the biz. They cant make us do more because of our age. We are always in pain and we get a good retirement. 40 years is about 2300 month, but the insurance is good
I work at Frys in arizona . Gm basically gets the credit for baby (shrink, holes, profit, etc) but it comes on the grocery load and we get the hours to stoxk it. Doesn't make sense to me.
When I calculate it, that's pretty much just throwing. I look at the label on the pallet to see how much is on it, then set myself a goal to have it done by. And I'm case counting myself.
Stay organized, get a uboat and put cases of the opposite end of the aisle onto it. Work your way down the aisle instead of randomly stocking. Power walk. Don't think or stress too much, just get that s*** onto the shelf. Don't worry about key refailing, just face the front ones. If it's more than a 15 foot walk to your trash cart, leave your trash in a neat pile every 20 feet section in the aisle, then quickly pick it all up at the end. For boxes that don't break down, put them in one spot, then use an empty uboat to haul them all back at the end of your aisle. Once again, work fast at a SMOOTH pace, rather than a FRANTIC pace, you'll drop less stuff.
