The difference is though it's not against company policy to ask customers if they would like a sample. I don't work in the deli, so I don't know if it's actually encouraged or not, but I do know that Kroger isn't going to fire a deli employee for providing a customer with a sample. It is company policy though that theft on the part of an employee can lead to termination. When a deli employee samples something themselves, it is not looked at as a potential sale or considered to be good customer service like it is with a customer. It is viewed as an employee eating for free on the company's dime. Ultimately, it's up to the discretion of the store manager. The store manager can go straight to the termination phase or the store manager can let the employee off with a warning and then move forward with termination if the employee is caught doing it again.
When i was still just a bakery clerk, there were 2 deli girls fired in the same night for taking the bakery sample cookies and putting icing on them and eating them. The icing was considered theft by a co-manager. The lady who was working in bakery that night, as well as me and another co-worker who closed frequently, were all given written warnings not to ever let anyone do that again or we'd be in trouble too.
Ever since then, i've repeated this story to every new hire and every store i've worked in.
I honestly feel like management was looking for any reason to fire those two.
TWhen a deli employee samples something themselves, it is not looked at as a potential sale or considered to be good customer service like it is with a customer. It is viewed as an employee eating for free on the company's dime.
But it can lead to good customer service. How can a deli employee be familiar with the product they're selling if they've never tasted it? You can't very well expect them to buy a bite of everything out of pocket so they can do their job.
It's different if they're doing something like "sampling" an entire plate of meat, but a slice here and a nibble there ought to be encouraged so they can make informed suggestions to customers.
(Note-- not deli/bakery, but I used to work for UDF. They encouraged us to sample the ice creams in the case regularly, both for the mentioned reason and to make sure the quality was good.)
TWhen a deli employee samples something themselves, it is not looked at as a potential sale or considered to be good customer service like it is with a customer. It is viewed as an employee eating for free on the company's dime.
But it can lead to good customer service. How can a deli employee be familiar with the product they're selling if they've never tasted it? You can't very well expect them to buy a bite of everything out of pocket so they can do their job.
It's different if they're doing something like "sampling" an entire plate of meat, but a slice here and a nibble there ought to be encouraged so they can make informed suggestions to customers.
(Note-- not deli/bakery, but I used to work for UDF. They encouraged us to sample the ice creams in the case regularly, both for the mentioned reason and to make sure the quality was good.)
The only time we've ever been allowed to do that is if it's a new product. Most of the time if tell someone something is good, they don't believe me anyway.
