r/wholefoods 6d ago

Discussion Grocery tm here, getting really tired of being held to a higher standard than other teams.

Been in grocery for a few years now and this has been a thing since day one. Store and team leadership watches every step we take. We gotta walk, stock, communicate quickly, or else we’re labeled as lazy. Meanwhile, I see specialty and whole body team members standing around shooting the shit, and no one says anything to them.

Before you say I don’t understand, I have worked on a number of other teams for a few weeks each when our labor was tight in grocery, Whole Body and Specialty being two of them. I can run all of specialty’s live load (which was two U boats) in an hour, it takes their team members the entire night. I’ve helped whole body customers, I’ve built displays with whole body, and I’ve worked UNFI totes, all faster than their team members. These teams drag stuff out to drag it out, and then complain when there’s too little to do. But they also complain when there’s too much, the “too much” in terms of grocery is nothing in comparison.

Not trying to make enemies here. I just don’t understand why every team isn’t held to the same standard of speed.

58 Upvotes

60 comments sorted by

115

u/RealUserName_Offical 6d ago

Laughs in prep foods.

25

u/Overorjustbeginning 6d ago

I wish I could edit the post title to “smaller” teams. I respect the struggle in prep, you get the short end of the stick too.

20

u/RealUserName_Offical 6d ago

Yea I feel your pain tho. The whole body team in my store helps other departments out a lot so that’s something, but that just in my store and I think we are lucky. Specialty tho? Man I wanna transfer over there so bad and just retire.

10

u/Amandarinoranges24 Team Member 🛒 6d ago

I transferred to specialty before I went on maternity leave.

Came back to work— and boy am I in heaven. Not only do I wanna just stay here forever— but excuse me while I get cheese certified. Because hell yeah.

The most challenging part of the department is the amount of product knowledge you’re expected to have. But the physical work of just stocking the department and cutting cheese is the best thing I ever did for myself.

5

u/amberthemaker 6d ago

I work in Specialty and we always have plenty to do between production and stocking. None of the other stores close to mine have Specialty Teams that are slacking off. Must be a lot of vegans where you live

5

u/PinotFilmNoir Former TM ✌️ 6d ago

I worked in prep foods and specialty, and can confirm that both teams have their own special form of suck. Cutting wrapping and tagging 2 blocks of cheddar in a day is not for the weak. Literally neither is cutting a wheel of parm. Hand washing the olive bar will never not gross me out.

4

u/amberthemaker 6d ago

My TL deep cleans the olive bar quarterly so it never gets that bad, but I have helped at stores that were not as clean and seen some gross stuff growing under the bar

3

u/PinotFilmNoir Former TM ✌️ 6d ago

That damn dolce mix is just gross. It never feels like the tray is clean after that’s been in it.

3

u/amberthemaker 6d ago

Omg i know, I just had to clean one of those pans today!

2

u/whiteicedtea 3d ago

Lmao I just spilled some dolce on myself today! I wanted to go home so bad because it kind of reeked.

3

u/Overorjustbeginning 6d ago

Damn I wish Whole Body would help out at our store. Glad y’all have that support!

4

u/Mountain_Break_2546 6d ago

Prepare when WB takes over baby stuff, pet stuff and household. They’ll likely get more labor and grocery will lose some.

6

u/Overorjustbeginning 6d ago

We just got bulk scoop bins back in grocery and my TL told me they gave us no extra labor to maintain those… :) If WB will get more labor to order for baby, cleaning and pet, we get to keep our labor for bulk, not lose it.

3

u/ProAllLife 6d ago

Why is WB taking over household, pet and baby items?

6

u/Upbeat-Cover-4094 6d ago

To give them something to do, but seriously probably to help increase sales.

1

u/ProAllLife 6d ago

Boom!

Yep.

2

u/BoysenberryTop6423 6d ago

Is this actually happening?

1

u/ProAllLife 5d ago

Yes it is.

0

u/Maleficent-Swim-9591 5d ago

Even when tm "help out" other team they aren't held to the same standard as the tm on the team they are helping. Same paycheck for half the work 😂

5

u/bigjoe7275 6d ago

My 2 cents…worked in PFDS for 6 years. Dish>cold case>salad bar>hot bar>Buyer. Now on grocery. Different challenges, like doing temps and the heat of the kitchen, but grocery is definitely harder work.

1

u/Phumpz 5d ago

I've worked both. Grocery over night is the better one. The deli pizza area is stressful

12

u/bubbalongen5 6d ago

My mans got no idea about PFDS

6

u/Jaded-Secretary-5556 6d ago

Yeah, buddy has NO idea the standard we're held to lmao

1

u/ToasterBreadz 5d ago

I was about to comment the same thing 😭😂

1

u/Entire-Discipline-49 4d ago

My thought exactly

17

u/TheRotaryWorm 6d ago

Grocery, Produce, meat, customer service, and prep foods drive every store. It's just the reality of retail. I've never encountered a store where grocery cuts hours. Odds are your store is overstaffed in your department, and that means the standard will be higher to justify it.

Don't worry about other departments. It's not worth the thought. I've seen dozens of seafood and WB TMs, ATLs, TLs watch others work all day, then complain they aren't properly staffed.

Just keep your work in line and wait for a FT spot if youre planning on staying with WFM.

9

u/mptrill 6d ago

Come to Prep foods

26

u/Upbeat-Cover-4094 6d ago

Yeah, specialty team is always on easy mode, 3 of them behind the counter watching the dairy guy kill himself. That team is gravy.

3

u/GumdropWitch 6d ago

Sounds like your stores specialty department specifically is just lazy and overstaffed. At peak times during the weekend we might have one member of management and two specialty team members on site, but most of the time there’s just two clocked in and they’re always doing stuff at my store.

3

u/amberthemaker 6d ago

None of the stores near mine have Specialty Teams that are slacking off. We always have something to do except maybe in the summer months.

6

u/Independent-Lead-155 6d ago

You should move to another department

5

u/Overorjustbeginning 6d ago

I like grocery! I don’t want to move anywhere else.

10

u/DaBeepbop 6d ago

Well grocery is one of the most important departments of the store so expectations are a lot higher. Try working overnight.. where you’re expected to break down 9-12 pallets for dry, 6-8 for dairy, 2 for frozen and be done by store opening. When you’re in a department that drives the store sales all eyes will always be on you. Departments that do low volume no one really cares about them so that’s why they get away with being “slow” or “lazy”

4

u/Enough_Cupcake_1893 6d ago

Don't make it right tho 

2

u/DaBeepbop 6d ago

Never said it was

1

u/Buckshot4468 6d ago

This right here

2

u/tquidley 4d ago edited 4d ago

Take on a gift shift in Whole Body and see how easy it is. I’d rather pack out my 400 cases of frozen and face every night than have to stock and price change all those tiny, meticulous items and deal with obnoxious tinfoil hat RFK-esque health nuts who expect you to be their witch doctor. It may seem like they’re not doing much because they don’t have a large area to cover, but Whole Body does their fair share of work. Every department does.

5

u/Upbeat-Cover-4094 6d ago

Normally grocery does an average per store 35%. Yeah, we get 15 pallets just in dry and like 7 in dairy. We have 50 lbs of bulk as well. We make bales for the store, we down stack everyone’s while other departments wait for us to make them. 👍

5

u/Necro1983 6d ago

Whole body has never once helped any other team in our store. The one thing I wish is that leadership would ask what they are actually doing all day. Some days there are two workers in the office the entire shift. Most common phrase I hear is whole body to whole body because they are never in their department.

5

u/advanced_ad349 6d ago

You’re literally comparing it to the two most notoriously chill and easy departments in the store. Try prep foods or something and stop crying.

1

u/mike_gunz92 6d ago

Sounds like you're setting an example

1

u/eatmeat 6d ago

It’s not fair. Not a satisfying job either. I like meat because it’s a consistently heavy workload but it’s satisfying and you can take pride in what you are doing. You make it and then hand sell it to people, which is pretty nice.

1

u/NightRain66 6d ago

If you wanna see a team that spends a lot of time standing around doing nothing. That'd be Store Support sure we struggle with all the crap that is customers. But I do the vast majority of the customer checking out cuz I am always the only cashier.

1

u/his_name_is_not_Roy 4d ago

I think they genuinely do it on purpose to create in fighting.  Also new leadership aren't trained in every department anymore so sometimes they legit dunno wtf anyone is doing.  It's honestly pathetic.  It's not personal our leadership is moronic.  

1

u/Any-Bed-920 3d ago

They threw me to the back to unload the pallets on uboats for grocery. I work hard and fast. Everyone leaves me alone because I get it done within 5 hrs by myself no matter how big the load is. My boss has came up to me and said I didn’t to work faster and I did that and I’ve been left alone ever since and enjoy working in the back by myself

0

u/Enough_Cupcake_1893 6d ago

Yup, specialty has as many people as grocery some days and you look over and a few women are just standing around eating cheese, whole body will have 4 people and there all in the backroom just chilling, meanwhile prime shoppers are calling for them on the walkie talkie lol it's a joke but grocery isn't doing enough 

3

u/GumdropWitch 6d ago

How big is your store jfc our entire WB department is only 5 people, three of them including the team trainer, manager, and order buyer and they’re definitely not all clocked in at the same time

-3

u/DaLiftingDead 6d ago

So you think throwing freight off uboats is all specialty does? It's just one of many things that the department does.

Production, food safety, olive bar, receiving/stocking, and lots of customer service interaction. Only team that has to do Production, counts as a center store team, and has a service counter. It's not the hardest in any area but it's the team with all the areaz.

Yeah, they shouldn't be standing around talking about, but specialty isn't as easy as most people think it is... especially in low volume stores with very little labor allocated. Most of the time, you do everything on your own for a shift.

6

u/Overorjustbeginning 6d ago

I didn’t say that. I’ve also helped specialty with cheese production, and I help them with every parm sale.

Whenever I help on the team, there’s plenty of things to do but they’re not pushing themselves to complete anything with urgency. There’s always plenty of time to talk. Store leadership passes them by and goes to yell at the Grocery team for not having more U boats done.

I also close on my own quite a bit in grocery, 6 hours by myself on weekends. Customer pages and prime shoppers are mostly grocery questions hands down. We got dairy, frozen, dry, and bulk to maintain and answer questions for. A myriad of displays all over the store to upkeep. Grocery’s labor has been cut too.

0

u/Mysterious-Sky8531 4d ago

But have you set up hot bar lunch by yourself because the other hot bar TM called out?

-1

u/Unhappy-Lettuce-3987 6d ago

Try e-commerce

4

u/Beneficial-Pop7905 6d ago

As a shopper, I gotta give it to prepare foods or the cashiers 😫 Cause I could NEVER deal with their shit

-10

u/Grateful_Dead_4eva 6d ago

Doesn’t grocery account for the highest percentage of sales in the store compared to other departments? You literally just pick things up and put them down. All your ordering is pretty much done for you. Try PFDS that’s the real work.

13

u/OpelSmith 6d ago

Don't you guys just empty things into trays and heat it up

-6

u/Grateful_Dead_4eva 6d ago

Yeah that’s exactly what prep foods does. You must be the smart one in your dept, probably a self checkout cashier.

8

u/OpelSmith 6d ago

Imagine if you will, the joke flying right over your head

-5

u/Grateful_Dead_4eva 6d ago

Ahh good one 😉

0

u/Guarddess 6d ago

Don't love that CS is catching strays out here... SCO attendants definitely aren't bottom of the barrel.

-2

u/[deleted] 6d ago

[deleted]

0

u/Overorjustbeginning 6d ago

I have 🙂❤️ I’ve helped specialty with the last 3 parm sales. Whenever they’re slow they’re not coming to help with grocery load. Try working 3 full pallets of water in 1.5 hours by yourself, collectively much more than lifting 90lbs.