So tomorrow is D-day for our store, as we are hosting the holiday walk thru from Corporate. As a relatively new employee still, I have no clue what that means all that much. Other than that they will have techs check out our freezer and say how it is supposed to look(I'm in the bakery, and will admit our freezer is still somewhat of a hot mess(nothing is on the floor, still in boxes, but it is still so utterly unorganized(even after one of our bakers "organized" things her way in there today(which was both somewhat nice, and yet still a mess as she didn't really show and tell people where things were til we needed to grab stuff. Namely making it easier to grab the bread doughs and so forth easier for her and the other bakers and the decorator and our new pastry chef's stuff is uber easy to get to. But for everyone else that stocks the floor we can barely reach stuff i.e. muffins that are freaking stacked to the ceiling(thank goodness for the few tall peeps we have in the dept. lately to reach up there even to get it. As I can't even reach it with our step ladder either), and having two days of holiday trucks of supplies to contend with too.
But yea other than keeping the floor stocked, pulling cookies that didn't look like they came out as good, and our Dept. Head kept saying to have a pyramid of something or other. I have no clue what Corporate is really looking for or what they say will be constructive criticism or more like a talking to kind of deal. I mean even though we are so far #1 in our division(and the dept. head says we are doing a good job keeping things filled everyday. And even the bakery has made more money than Produce this first time ever(which not surprising there, we have like 10 or so displays and what not out, but just saying), from what we were told the other day and also I won't be there tomorrow as I'm off.
But yea, I just don't want to come back in Thursday and find the mood has changed, cause although we are getting positive feedback so far. Corporate might be like, "yea this or that is okay. But ya'll totally need to improve the hell out of this. And who even told you guys half this or that is okay?" As I had heard from our cake decorator before our old store was officially closed when she came back to get some more of her supplies. That, our bakers was taught all wrong how to do our bread slack out. So they had to re-learn a lot of stuff over again. And so far I haven't heard otherwise about anything else being wrong. But you just never know.
So anyone else experience a Holiday walk thru at their store and what were the results?
Expect everyone to act "a fool and crazy panicked" (me, I don't give a flying phuck about ANY walk through anymore. We're short staffed and short on hours so nothing much we can do)
They'll walk through each dept and pick out the things wrong in all department. For each thing right, they'll "find" 2-3 things wrong.
Some RARE occurrences though, they have found only one or two things wrong in that dept.
They'll also walk the rest of the lobby making sure we have everything faced properly and there are no holes. Also that the tags are correct and we have correct pricing.
They'll check our OOS's and make sure we ordered the correct amount and have it on hand. Also make sure our stockroom is neat and organized.
They'll hunt for hidden go-backs. One we had a holiday walk and they went OUTSIDE To our storage unit and found 4 carts of hidden non perishables overflowing carts
Prior to the walk through our store is showroom quality. Like the stores you see on the kroger training videos. About a day or day and a half later, the hotmess returns
They'll hunt for hidden go-backs. One we had a holiday walk and they went OUTSIDE To our storage unit and found 4 carts of hidden non perishables overflowing carts
lol.
They probably learned about the "trade secret" by reading this forum.
I suggested hiding unsightly backstock uboats in the salvage trailer and locking it up to a co manager the other day before a "special vip visit" She didn't think it was very funny.
Oh boy, yea I've nervous about all the stuff they might find wrong. I mean even with a new team leader, dept. head and the dude that is above the dept. head's head and the new store manager guy on ear pieces and pointing out this or that needs to be stocked here and there. I can still imagine there will be some things gone wrong. And I sooooo think that is do to such a major lack of communication about essential things the majority of the time. So guess I'll be hearing about the fall out tomorrow when I'm back in there. Oy vey. Thanks again.
we had a walk through for newer grocery managers recently. they suddenly found hours to get the store looking great, gave overtime, had managers getting everything spic n span.
THen comes the walk
"gee everything sure does look good, how come you guys can't get everything done"
Ha ya, no kidding. The Dept. Head was saying the same thing about the over time. Even one of the baker's was like "you know you can stay over, the DH said it was cool. I'm doing it for the holidays etc." But dude, I value my days off like nobodies business. I mean we already are doing 8 hour days back to back because it's a new store. I totally need my time off to soak my feet, heck catch up on my stuff I barely get time to do at home. And with them pushing my days off towards the end of the week now. I am definitely not offering to stay over. No way in the hell.
Honestly I thought it was something major going on with that. Cause I didn't see neither the dept. head or the guy above him over the floor today. Heck not even the new store manager just save for once. And to be honest we surely needed the extra hands to help keep things stocked today. Heck even the pastry chef chick wasn't there and she is there about everyday!
But yea, all that aside, our cake decorator was saying it was likely a walk thru with some of the managers from other stores in nearby areas. As we are the top store, so they have to see how things should be I guess. But still communicate that to the peeps. Don't have me thinking we are going to be in deep doo doo or something. Although in a way I think we still are as the techs have seriously flipped our freezer on it's ear once more. And it's doubly hard as hell finding crap all over again.
It's all a show to pretend like the store stays at standard all the time.
If they wanted real walks, they would show up without being scheduled.
You'll see a team of coordinators staying a store ahead of whoever is walking, fancying things up and making sure they are as close to perfect as can be... and then they vanish when they get the text from the store the exec is at, that the person is leaving and coming to the next store. Then they daisy chain to the next one in line. It's stupid really.
It just aids in them being able to justify the low amount of hours they gave us with high expectations.
Want a real snap shot of a store? walk into stores with a bad percent effective from low staffing without telling anyone you are coming, on a monday morning at about 8am. and quickly walk the perimeter without letting the store manager hold you up so they can scramble to fix things and hide drinks and crap before you come.
A few weeks ago they showed up at 5 AM one day. I think it was to check out the grocery department since that's the department that receives the lowest scores. Besides, they were the only ones in the store except for the overnight checker, a produce clerk, and the baker.
