Okay so the day before yesterday we had this huge 14 tray order for a Funeral Home to pick up the next day. Amongst a few other orders that were due for that day as well. So naturally I was tasked with lending a hand(completed 3 veggie trays and 2 fruit trays), and we managed to get everything done on time for when they arrived.
No probs on getting it all onto one of the tall boys to be wheeled up to the front and then out to the guy's car after he paid. Well long story short when I was working on the fruit trays, I noticed that the packages of the strawberries I was using had some mold in it. So okay, I chocked it up to it being one package they probably missed the other day when rotating stuff out and just hit the floor to get another package of them. Welp, I find another 2 packages that also had varying degrees of mold in them as well. As I was busy with the trays and didn't have time to track down one of the produce peeps to let them know they might need to take those packages off the floor, I let it go til today.
To which, I made a point of letting two of the older produce dudes know(as I figured some of the younger peeps might have saw it and just didn't say anything or didn't know what to do if they had to handle it. Unlike how I imagined the older guys would have taken them down and any others to be scanned out or checked their supplies in the back) that I found mold in the strawberries. And was informed rather matter of fact, "Strawberries always have mold in them. Nothing to worry about. Thanks for saying something though." Which majorly had me WTFing...like what in the world do you mean that mold is ALWAYS in the strawberries?! I mean don't get me wrong, everything will mold if you give it enough time. But dude, if they are coming in like that and they aren't doing something about it. What if someone bought them and got sick or something? Was my main thoughts. As it wasn't just a little mold. On the back inner sections, it was some very noticeable heavy mold growing, like it had been setting up for a while from the distributor to us. I doubt it goes with the "Fresh and Friendly" aspect of things either.
Has anybody else experienced or dealt with this? And if so, how does YOUR store handle it? I scanned the first package I had of them out as damage. But I don't know if I should let a store manager know as well too or not.
I hope you informed those produce people that strawberries do not always have mold on them. If they actually think that way, they have no business working in produce.
They are delivered with mold on them sometimes. They also have a very short shelf life and need to be culled often.
Mold is not normal. They should have pulled them right away.
If your stores' Produce osat score is in the toilet, now you know why.
But I thought in the computer learning module thingies it said that if we have something that is damaged or not looking right, we should send it back or something like that? I thought that was something that it said that we could do too. Or not accept the shipment if it wasn't up to par.
Yea, you would think that they would have. I mean they always have some sort of fruit salad in the produce salad bar. So I don't know if they are using strawberries or not(I'm always running around doing other stuff to really give it a good look over there) and just cutting off the mold to make that particular salad or what. But that is definitely very concerning too if they are.
I haven't really made it to huddles in a while, and no one has really mentioned Produce's osat either of late. But oh yea, I more than agree that can totally tank them for sure.
I hope you informed those produce people that strawberries do not always have mold on them. If they actually think that way, they have no business working in produce.
Out my mouth I didn't say anything as I had to get to the time clock(and just being shocked that they were so cavalier). But I'm sure they could have read my facial expression that was saying I wasn't buying it. So they were trying to be so emphatic about it being a normal thing.
There's almost always at least one moldy package, usually more, per shipment of strawberries we get in. Those packages go in the trash unless we just miss it when putting them out. Sounds like your store's produce department doesn't want to do their jobs.
They are delivered with mold on them sometimes. They also have a very short shelf life and need to be culled often.
Mold is not normal. They should have pulled them right away.
If your stores' Produce osat score is in the toilet, now you know why.
But I thought in the computer learning module thingies it said that if we have something that is damaged or not looking right, we should send it back or something like that? I thought that was something that it said that we could do too. Or not accept the shipment if it wasn't up to par.
Yea, you would think that they would have. I mean they always have some sort of fruit salad in the produce salad bar. So I don't know if they are using strawberries or not(I'm always running around doing other stuff to really give it a good look over there) and just cutting off the mold to make that particular salad or what. But that is definitely very concerning too if they are.
I haven't really made it to huddles in a while, and no one has really mentioned Produce's osat either of late. But oh yea, I more than agree that can totally tank them for sure.
This is why I'm glad Kroger is prepackaging things now at their warehouse and shipping it out, because the people in the stores cannot and will not do any quality control. At least if someone were to get a moldy package their would be no excuse and the store and company would have to take responsibility for selling a bad prepackaged item. But having strawberry pieces that are in a fruit tray or in a fruit and salad bar that were a part of a moldy strawberry is scary.
If there are one or two bad moldy ones they want u to cull through it remove the bad ones and repackage it. Sounds like the whole dept doesn't care or just crappy management
To be fair, the strawberries have been absolutely terrible this year. Ive thrown more out this year any other year Ive done this. Culling is one thing, but they just dont hold up longer than a day (maybe two).
They come in moldy. The ones that look okay can mold in hours to days. It is NOT always possible to catch a bad container depending on where the bad berries are situated. We are supposed to flip every container to check three times a day (freshness checks); however, we work for Kroger - the land of understaffing and hour shortages. We just do not have enough time. Heck, around here we rarely line apples anymore. We have just enough time to dump them out.
We threw away and/or composted about 50 strawberry packages today alone. We are not allowed to just pick out the bad ones and the amount we lose is not reported to the warehouse. Strawberries are not scanned out here.
They are delivered with mold on them sometimes. They also have a very short shelf life and need to be culled often.
Mold is not normal. They should have pulled them right away.
If your stores' Produce osat score is in the toilet, now you know why.
But I thought in the computer learning module thingies it said that if we have something that is damaged or not looking right, we should send it back or something like that? I thought that was something that it said that we could do too. Or not accept the shipment if it wasn't up to par.
Yea, you would think that they would have. I mean they always have some sort of fruit salad in the produce salad bar. So I don't know if they are using strawberries or not(I'm always running around doing other stuff to really give it a good look over there) and just cutting off the mold to make that particular salad or what. But that is definitely very concerning too if they are.
I haven't really made it to huddles in a while, and no one has really mentioned Produce's osat either of late. But oh yea, I more than agree that can totally tank them for sure.
This is why I'm glad Kroger is prepackaging things now at their warehouse and shipping it out, because the people in the stores cannot and will not do any quality control. At least if someone were to get a moldy package their would be no excuse and the store and company would have to take responsibility for selling a bad prepackaged item. But having strawberry pieces that are in a fruit tray or in a fruit and salad bar that were a part of a moldy strawberry is scary.
But sounds l8e your store is just nasty.
That is the thing. I did talk to someone I know better in the Produce department and even he said it is normal for there to be mold in the strawberries when they come in. But it should NOT be making it's way out to the floor.
So at least I guess 1 of the peeps are trying to keep some of the moldy product at bay. Rather it's normal or not.
And alrighty, I guess the consensus is that moldy strawberries are standard fare. Still glad I said something though to at least a few different folks just to get a well rounded view of the situation.
They come in moldy. The ones that look okay can mold in hours to days. It is NOT always possible to catch a bad container depending on where the bad berries are situated. We are supposed to flip every container to check three times a day (freshness checks); however, we work for Kroger - the land of understaffing and hour shortages. We just do not have enough time. Heck, around here we rarely line apples anymore. We have just enough time to dump them out.
We threw away and/or composted about 50 strawberry packages today alone. We are not allowed to just pick out the bad ones and the amount we lose is not reported to the warehouse. Strawberries are not scanned out here.
I absolutely agree.............the strawberries have been a PAIN this year! Nearly every shipment has had moldy ones mixed in. Sometimes it's obvious (moldy ones on top in plain view) and other times just one or two, hidden in the center of the package. It is MUCH more difficult to make sure they are all oK than what you might think if you are not an employee in the produce department!!!
And of course we DO NOT HAVE ENOUGH time to stand there and carefully cull through the packages and remove the moldy ones, repacking them with good ones in the other packages.......that is very time consuming, and especially with holidays, it is crazy to expect us to do so, when our time is limited, hordes of customers are swarming through the produce dept, other items are running out.
I (personally) always scan out anything with UPC labels, although some packages of stuff probably get thrown out without being scanned, thus some BOHs end up being off somewhat.
I've scanned out dozens and dozens of packages of strawberrries in one day. Sometimes one particular brand of strawberries will be in GREAT shape, nice and red and fresh-looking, and the very next day the shipment will be a different brand, and many of them moldy and nasty looking.
We do get some moldy strawberries on the load. It takes a while to get them from the field to packaging to the store. If we see it, they will never make it to the floor. We check them when culling in the morning, and when refilling. A package can look normal and healthy when we check, but sometimes all it takes is a good juggle by a customer to uncover some hidden mold. Needless to say that mold grows fast. Of course we try to catch them all, but that's near impossible. We appreciate when we get heads up from another employee, like you did, Bakerchick.
