At my first store, which was not too small but definitely not very big, misplaced was at USCAN and mostly (mostly) confined to baskets on a rack, with some of it ending up on top of the rack and on horrible days, in carts next to the rack. This is kind of out of the customers' way, tucked into a corner.
Courtesy clerks would work a basket in down time, but night crew put away the grocery items (it was like pulling teeth to get drug/gm to do it though).
The damaged went in the damaged cart and got taken to the back dock at like 6 am to be scanned out and thrown out or marked down.
At this new store, which is like a step below a marketplace (we have sushi and a salad bar and an olive bar and just so much stuff!), misplaced is dumped at customer service and rarely worked and it's horrible. We have it "sorted" into little buggies which quickly overflow and it's just a mess. Damaged is back there too and we never have time to run the perishable damaged back and keep it under control. Management just brings up carts and carts of misplaced all day. And since it's back in customer service, it's easy for everyone to ignore so it builds up. I don't think I've seen the nutrition/produce/deli buggy empty once in five months.
Courtesy clerks work it when they can but they never want to tackle nutrition or drug/gm. We have special needs kids work it some days during the school year but they only make the smallest of dents. Depending on how busy it is and whether there's an extra body up there, we'll scan out the damaged and haul it to the dumpster, but it takes time. and a gun login, which i don't have.
It's just frustrating to have the small space of customer service crowded with like 20 small buggies and occasionally gnats. Also I left uscan at my old store dangit and didn't deal with misplaced at customer service and now I have to which is a travesty, I tell ya. (though i don't have to do cigarettes, thank the retail gods. or run uscan and customer service on sunday mornings like i saw at a tiny store)
How is it at your stores? Is it literal hell on earth at the marketplaces?
Ours is pretty much the same way as at your first store, except it's between the front doors and customer service against the wall. Still unobtrusive though. The only problem we have is our night-shift person is ridiculously lazy, so will only do gobacks if he's in a good mood or some such BS. But some of our courtesy clerks are expertly fast with them, so we rarely have a go-back stay there for more than 24 hours.
for my store they are put on a rack inside the bottle room and the CC work it as they get the time. the baskets are labeled with isle numbers, but seeing things fo different isles mixed together is common since the newbies don't know locations most the time. haha.
__________________
Would you like fries with th... I mean, your milk in a bag?
