If so, stocking question:

My favorite grocery store is consistently out of a couple of my standard items.

If they can't keep it in stock, why don't they order larger quantities? Is it corporate overlords? Computerized restocking? Product shortages? Lazy stockers?

I'm of no help. When this happens to me I order it off of Amazon

The only thing I can advise is to ask the owner or manager.

The only thing I can add is when I was a local manger for W T GRANT we had what then was called a open to buy and if you spent it all in dept. A,B ECT then there was no money for dept. g. That was also true within the DEPTS and today I think that would be more so.


























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can add is

quote:

My favorite grocery store is consistently out of a couple of my standard items.

I have a local Home Depot where I buy 5/16" drill bits. At least I try to. For months every time I went they had none. I figured there must be a huge demand for 5/16" bits.

A couple of weeks ago I stopped again, and nada. I caught one of the guys working there to ask what the deal was. He whipped out his little hand held device, scanned the tag, and it showed 15 in stock. There were none.

He said that the computer would automatically order more when the number hit 5, but since it was showing 15 and there were actually zero, it never ordered more. He was able to reset the number to zero which triggered the order.

Ever since, they've always had 5/16" drill bits.

quote:

Originally posted by PHPaul:
My favorite grocery store is consistently out of a couple of my standard items.

If they can't keep it in stock, why don't they order larger quantities? Is it corporate overlords? Computerized restocking? Product shortages? Lazy stockers?

All of the above and probably a few other issues.
If this is a corporate chain, then much of their stock monitoring will be algorithmic and triggers an auto reorder. The crux to this auto reordering is does it just re-stock what was sold or, does it flag how rapidly that item is sold-through (velocity) and increase the reorder quantity. A good system will flag it and notify that department/category manager that they should consider bumping-up their orders, many places aren't so advanced and only take notice if somebody, like yourself, lets them know what's going on. Squeaky-wheel gets the grease

quote:

Originally posted by a1abdj:

quote:

My favorite grocery store is consistently out of a couple of my standard items.

I have a local Home Depot where I buy 5/16" drill bits. At least I try to. For months every time I went they had none. I figured there must be a huge demand for 5/16" bits.

A couple of weeks ago I stopped again, and nada. I caught one of the guys working there to ask what the deal was. He whipped out his little hand held device, scanned the tag, and it showed 15 in stock. There were none.

He said that the computer would automatically order more when the number hit 5, but since it was showing 15 and there were actually zero, it never ordered more. He was able to reset the number to zero which triggered the order.

Ever since, they've always had 5/16" drill bits.

That's an interesting story!

Many of the independent distributors are being pushed out. My wife and I distributed Pepperidge Farm and Peets coffee products in our area. It Was our responsibility to order inventory and stock the shelves in all the local grocery stores as well as Walmarts and Targets. We had about sixty stops in our territory. The way you made money was to keep everything stocked and all the code dates fresh. We knew what the best sellers were and always ordered proper inventory. It's how we made money by paying attention to our business and we made a damn good living out of it.

We had that business for thirty years. We just recently sold the Pepperidge Farm those products are still maintained by a independent. Peets went to warehousing with the big grocery distributors. Bottom line is the grocery stores don't have employees who really give a shit about ordering or rotating product or keeping things stocked. I just shake my head now when I look at the Peets coffee set in a store. It has about half the space from when we took care of it and the shelf is always out of things and usually just a mess.

quote:

Originally posted by lastmanstanding:
It Was our responsibility to order inventory and stock the shelves in all the local grocery stores as well as Walmarts and Targets. We had about sixty stops in our territory.

Count & Fill sales....I did it for socks and eye-retainers for a bit. I never liked that method of sales however the simple fact was the harder you worked at it, the better your business would usually turn-out; provided you planned your driving route and expenses correctly.

Supply chain manager, retired here. For instance a buyer for a chain may be assigned dairy items for 10 stores. One store may constantly run out of skim milk, gallon size, while others have plenty. Buyer only orders total amount for 10 stores each week without checking individual store
inventory. Computer inventory may be at fault as the pencil necks in data, accounting and systems management may well have narrowed vision. Buyer may have been told “don’t think”, do what system says. 1 store remains constantly short of skim milk.

It may also be the chain playing games with small suppliers.

We, briefly, tried selling in grocery stores. They didn’t pay on time, we didn’t deliver.

They ended up with empty shelf space for months because they refused to pay.

Took them about a year and a half to pay their bills.

(That chain did end up replacing management and is supposed to be better. There are honest players but it’s probably the most crooked business I’ve been exposed to. Maybe second to scrap metal.)

quote:

Originally posted by a1abdj:

quote:

My favorite grocery store is consistently out of a couple of my standard items.

I have a local Home Depot where I buy 5/16" drill bits. At least I try to. For months every time I went they had none. I figured there must be a huge demand for 5/16" bits.

A couple of weeks ago I stopped again, and nada. I caught one of the guys working there to ask what the deal was. He whipped out his little hand held device, scanned the tag, and it showed 15 in stock. There were none.

He said that the computer would automatically order more when the number hit 5, but since it was showing 15 and there were actually zero, it never ordered more. He was able to reset the number to zero which triggered the order.

Ever since, they've always had 5/16" drill bits.

Had the same experience at Home Depot with trying to find deck stain in a specific color. The spot was empty for weeks. Finally asked an employee, who looked in the computer and said they had 25 in stock. Well maybe in the overhead shelf storage that no one could find or some employee took a pallet out the back door for their side business. They had to reset the number and thus ordered more. It seems pretty obvious that employees do not walk through their dept and check the reason why shelf spots are empty for weeks on end.

quote:

Originally posted by Aglifter:
We, briefly, tried selling in grocery stores. They didn’t pay on time, we didn’t deliver.

They ended up with empty shelf space for months because they refused to pay.

Took them about a year and a half to pay their bills.

The answer to half the questions I get either from management or others....why is their inventory levels so low or, why are we not in there?
Well...they're not very good at paying their bills or, they're good for one PO a season because their credit is so bad/low.

I am cynical... large stores now are software driven. Sales/inventory are data managed at point of sale and physical inventories are not that common.

Stock shrinkage (theft) is sadly very common, and it is not until a customer complains that the loss is discovered.

When California made the $900 theft the felony level, shrinkage became rampant, with nothing the stores could do about it except try to lock down more valuable items.

Somehow, thievery from big stores has become accepted as a cost of doing business - we all pay for it.

quote:

Originally posted by corsair:

quote:

Originally posted by PHPaul:
My favorite grocery store is consistently out of a couple of my standard items.

If they can't keep it in stock, why don't they order larger quantities? Is it corporate overlords? Computerized restocking? Product shortages? Lazy stockers?

All of the above and probably a few other issues.
If this is a corporate chain, then much of their stock monitoring will be algorithmic and triggers an auto reorder. The crux to this auto reordering is does it just re-stock what was sold or, does it flag how rapidly that item is sold-through (velocity) and increase the reorder quantity. A good system will flag it and notify that department/category manager that they should consider bumping-up their orders, many places aren't so advanced and only take notice if somebody, like yourself, lets them know what's going on. Squeaky-wheel gets the grease

CAO (Computer Assisted Ordering) is a wonderful tool but needs constant monitoring and assistance,


35 yrs in the grocery biz, left in 2015

say a can of corn, xyz brand, 14oz,

CAI will have the quantity on hand, updated every few minutes (usually about 15 minutes) as the corn is scanned at the register,

the computer knows sales history, knows when it was sold, and depending on volume and where the minimum order point is, and delivery frequency, it will order a case, or more as needed,


however, the maintanence part is important,

mis pick in the warehouse, so you got billed for that case of corn (either 12 or 24 in a case) , as in it was added to your delivery, but you got a case of green beans instead,

or nothing,

either way, you have to know where yoru backstock is, if any, check that and displays, and then see if you are off 12or 24 cans

change it in the system, manually order what you need to fill

for some items, we would change the minimum seasonally to keep it in the store,


another factor is seasonal items, as in availabiliy

did the buyers get enough ,
was the truck delivering to the warehouse late

and many many more factors that can cause shortages,


we had to scan all our holes (out of stocks in the departments) every day, and find out why it was empty,

many times it was a supply issue if it lasted more than a few days,



and yes, there are lazy stockers, lazy dept heads, lazy assistant manager and lazy managers, but they usually get flushed out in that biz

quote:

Originally posted by lastmanstanding:
Many of the independent distributors are being pushed out. My wife and I distributed Pepperidge Farm and Peets coffee products in our area. It Was our responsibility to order inventory and stock the shelves in all the local grocery stores as well as Walmarts and Targets. We had about sixty stops in our territory. The way you made money was to keep everything stocked and all the code dates fresh. We knew what the best sellers were and always ordered proper inventory. It's how we made money by paying attention to our business and we made a damn good living out of it.

We had that business for thirty years. We just recently sold the Pepperidge Farm those products are still maintained by a independent. Peets went to warehousing with the big grocery distributors. Bottom line is the grocery stores don't have employees who really give a shit about ordering or rotating product or keeping things stocked. I just shake my head now when I look at the Peets coffee set in a store. It has about half the space from when we took care of it and the shelf is always out of things and usually just a mess.

Pepperidge Farm is the gold standard of bread and cookie retailers,

the guys in this area make money by the wheelbarrow load with those routes,

some of the bread routes were that way for a good while, but I understand a lot of that has changed just a bit,

quote:

Originally posted by tleddy:
I am cynical... large stores now are software driven. Sales/inventory are data managed at point of sale and physical inventories are not that common.

Stock shrinkage (theft) is sadly very common, and it is not until a customer complains that the loss is discovered.

When California made the $900 theft the felony level, shrinkage became rampant, with nothing the stores could do about it except try to lock down more valuable items.

Somehow, thievery from big stores has become accepted as a cost of doing business - we all pay for it.

when I left, I was running a hood store, lots of shrink

we got inventoried once a year for Grocery, FF, Dairy, Alcohol, packaged meat, packages produce (bag salad and a few other things) and GM

the perishables, (meat, deli, produce, Bakery) did thier inventories every ohter month,


physical inventory , as in count everything, and the balance on hands were adjusted to relect the new balances, (meaning you better get on the next order and edit, cause you were going ot get hit very hard on next delivery



re Shrink,

theft is horrible, but unless you are in the hood, theft is manageable,
and even then if your volume is high enough (sales) a one time hit on the shrink line from theft is nothing,

last store I ran was a hood store, about 60K sq feet, I wanna say about 30K in head count weekly (city store near 2 colleges, so lots of daily foot traffic)

very profitable store, avg 7-8%, monthly, and avg less pharm and fuel was 800K a week in sales,

theft was rampant, locked someone up almost every day, usually a handful at a time,

and yet the inventory numbers only usually took a hit that one period, and would still be profitable that period, just 2-3%,,,


you will never catch all the shoplifters, ever,
you have employees stealing too,

and you have a lot of shrink from billing issues,


at one time Arnold Bakery had a sales rep that was prohibited from delivering to several stores on his route, he got caught stealing product from the stores, both in billing ''errors'' and outright shoplifting,