Archived Any tips for zoning faster ?

[verblichen]

Its been about three weeks now thou the speed of my zoning still sucks. I never get half my section done within my eight hrs (also due to back up calls and re-shops). When I zone I tend to pull every item forward if I can reach it. Should I just pull a few things only? Any tips?

 

[Hardlinesmaster]

These days, at least 3 items forward.

 

[NitroKing2110]

Use both hands. It sounds simple, but it gave me about a 50% speed improvement over time once I got used to it. It will feel awkward at first especially if you're one of those who can't do much with their non-dominant hand. Like myself, I'm right handed and I can't even hold a pencil with my left hand unless it's a fist, but you'll get accustomed to it.

Zone block by block. Try to spend no more than 5 minutes on each 4 foot block. Fix the major issues and if you have time, come back and do what I call the "OCD Zone" making everything look especially pretty. If your store has a visit upcoming, superzone the first 4 foot section facing the racetrack of each aisle and the front endcaps, and do a regular zone of the rest. If you have time, come back and superzone the second section facing the racetrack. This makes it look, from a "walk the racetrack" perspective, like a better zone. This doesn't mean disregard the rest of the zone, it just means pay special attention to the first parts of it.

Work your strays as you find them, within a 5 aisle radius. I try to divide my cart into backstock (bottom), non-department strays (child seat), within this 5 aisle zone strays (front of big basket) and all other in-department strays (back of big basket). When I finish 5 aisles, I work the strays for those aisles.

Walk the aisle first and pull all the strays. This will make it easier to zone what's actually supposed to be there.

As hard as it can be, try to reserve the "OCD Zone" for last. First, worry about pulling at least 3 items forward and covering the diamonds, and later worry about such things like "are the boxes perfectly lined up with each other" and "is it ruler-straight with the front edge of the shelf"

I'm not sure on your store's volume, but at my store, I (photo closer) am assigned all of Movies, Music, and Books (H block) and Stationery (Half of G), but sometimes if the LOD feels vindictive, H block and Toys. I can usually finish H block and stationery in my 3 hour, 45 minute shift, but that's just a "make this presentable" zone and does not include H block re-shop (which the photo opener does) and going for backup, but it does include helping guests in electronics.

 

[sigma7]

You should be able to get through a four foot section faster than 5 minutes. Shoot, that would be spending an hour in just one valley. And nearly an hour or more just on one of my grocery aisles. I agree with most of the rest of your post. Although I'm a tad envious that you have someone who will just zone MMB and stationary. MMB doesn't get touched at my store except for picking out foreign and putting up returns. And stationary gets all of maybe 20 minutes for the whole department to be zoned.

 

[NitroKing2110]

You should be able to get through a four foot section faster than 5 minutes. Shoot, that would be spending an hour in just one valley. And nearly an hour or more just on one of my grocery aisles. I agree with most of the rest of your post. Although I'm a tad envious that you have someone who will just zone MMB and stationary. MMB doesn't get touched at my store except for picking out foreign and putting up returns. And stationary gets all of maybe 20 minutes for the whole department to be zoned.

Oh yes, you should be able to get through it faster, 5 minutes serves two purposes:
It's first a goal to reach if you're slower than that
It's a time at which you move on to stop yourself from spending too much time in one section and getting tunnel vision.

You can set yourself goals to eventually get down to one minute a section max, 5 is just a starting point and a point at which you say I'm moving on, I'll come back if time permits.

As far as MMB goes, it's because my store is laid out with MMB right by photo and stationery right by that, so they figure they have the photo person do that because there's always a closer because our hours don't drop below 28/week for the department. Although the LOD often has us do other things like stray sorting. We also help electronics, and except for when we are zoning or doing photo things, we are essentially electronics TMs, keys and all.

 

[Ringwraith917]

Sweep everything off the shelves "shopping spree style" and your empty shelf will be perfectly zoned. Takes about 2-3 seconds per shelf. *





*Only do this on your last day