Archived The Big & Dandy Backroom thread!

[tgtguy]

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We have been fighting that battle for years and I do mean years...we are always told that its not planos job to do their backstock etc. We ( backroom) don't have the hours and with mytime and 4x4s its only worse. Our stores leadership just doesn't see the big picture I guess

Backroom shouldn't have to 4x4. Process team. In theory.

I agree... getting leadership to see that point is a totally different. They claim that if they don't make the backroom do 4x4 then some other work center will wont to be excused as well...etc etc

That's bull right there. flow/BR are exempt. In theory.

Sometimes, they will let certain areas of flow ie softlines keep pushing and not do the 4x4...but usually the whole logistics process stops at 9 am...for about an hour mon-fri no matter what .

 

[tgtguy]

Oh and I almost forgot that on Sundays trucks....they have the flow and backroom come in at 7 ( we are a 730 process store) we have to do the ad....until its done...so we usually don't get to the backroom till around 830-9am. Are any other stores doing this ?

 

[fearlessprice]

It's still available for us since the new subt appeared surprisingly. They told us it would be obsolete but if it disappeared one day I would throw my pda and refuse to pull anything. I would rather just carry an lpda for pulls and myfa and a pda for other rfapps. Our Plano sucks but that's been that way in all stores I've been in or heard from. Ours are all 300 pound lazy people that take all of our smart carts and don't know how to separate vendor product after I've told then numerous times!

 

[fearlessprice]

Oh and I almost forgot that on Sundays trucks....they have the flow and backroom come in at 7 ( we are a 730 process store) we have to do the ad....until its done...so we usually don't get to the backroom till around 830-9am. Are any other stores doing this ?

Wtf? 7am store? How the hell do you get the push done? I thought I had it bad at 4am it's rather be overnight but we are a B volume. I know c volume a are 6am does that make your store a D volume? in which case it costs the company more to keep it open than it profits. How does instocks scan anything efficiently before cafs drop at 11 that would be brutal

 

[tgtguy]

We don't have 11 am cafs. For years our cafs started at noon...bot about two months ago they started dropping at one instead. We are not the only 730 am store in our district is common practice. We started off at 4 am ( I did that for over 14 years) then we went to 6 am and now at 730. The push is a nightmare to say the least.

 

[fearlessprice]

Where are your sales at? Were average about 42 million a year so we are B volume. The store I was at before was 60 million a year and they were overnight A Volume. The only D volumes we have in California are generally at 20 million a year and you get hardly any payroll and only 4etls

 

[Anonymous12345]

Is there anyone out there that has successfully found a way to consistently have small 11am & 12pm CAFs on truck days? I have the Pfresh team using SUBT9999 on FDC days but there is no way the flow team can SUBT9999 all of their backstock, it would waste too much payroll. If there was a way to know what items would re-pull, I would have them SUBT9999 but there's not.

Now without the RF SUBT app, it's even more difficult. Maybe once everything crosses over to the web apps it will be easier, but until then...

I have a few ideas but I haven't implemented them yet. Let me know if you think these will work or tell me what is working for your store currently...

• Do not backstock any challenge items unless you are sure it's backstock. If it is then backstock and use SUBT9999 (I'm pretty sure all challenge items will pull in 11s or 12s if this is not done)
• Once all your backstock is complete off the truck you can drop manual CAFs for all fill groups. After this step I'm not sure what is the most productive thing to do...

1. Physically pull all the batches and re-push them (the pull would probably be 1-2 hours). Then you backstock whatever is is true backstock and use SUBT9999
2. Or you can only physically pull the items you know will go out by using the instock book in item search (on-hand 10, capacity 20 it should go out) This can be applied for challenge too. If the logic shows it won't go out, then you can SUBT9999 those items. Or you could enter 9999 in your pull, hit yes for pull all and then STO after but this inflates your pull eaches on the pull type reports

Any way you look at it is someone would have to do the extra work, either flow or backroom day. I just feel it's better for flow to do it because, one it's from their truck and two it's not fun for the BR Day team to pull a huge CAF at a peak sales hour and it really sets them far behind on the push and other BR tasks. Also it's easier to do this in the morning with less guest traffic or overnight with no guest traffic depending on your unload times.

I feel like this is easily one of the biggest payroll wasters out of all processes by far and it happens almost everyday like clockwork depending on how many trucks you have. Don't get me wrong sometimes the stuff actually is not pushed right and goes right out but I wish the system would always prompt you before backstocking it, if it knows it's going to re-pull in the next CAF.

I know this issue has been brought up on this site many times, I'm sure there is someone out there that has found a viable solution to this problem......

Help! Lol

 

[StackerMistress]

Found out SUBT was taken out yesterday during the 12 pm CAFs when I was asked to pull 30 different DVDs that were backstocked in the morning. Wasn't going to waste my time toggling over to a different app to take care of each one, so I just pulled all of it and stuck a SUBT9999 sign on it... this was such a poor idea. I understand wanting to get rid of RFapps, but why not move everything all at once instead of separating one of the most crucial backroom functions?

ADDED: OMG spent three times as long SUBT999-ing all the DVDs and BluRays from the electronics transition that have been sitting in the elec stockroom for days. Managed to get through 3 three-tiers... there's still two more (super full ones) to go. What a miserable, tedious experience.

 

[StackerMistress]

Ugh, I don't know about the rest of you, but this week's "save $10 on your $40+ store pickup order" is killing me. Every 10 minutes over the walkie on Sunday as I was trying to get EVERYTHING done alone... "Hey, StackerMistress, there's an FF to get." "Hey, just so you know, there's another FF." "Hey, StackerMistress, there's an order that's about to expire, can you go grab it?" As if I am the ONLY DAMN PERSON WHO CAN GET FLEXIBLE FULFILLMENTS IN THE BUILDING. All the leaders are trained to do it, too!

Combine that with the fact that most of them were either large, bulky items, or multiple items sending me all over the store (did you REALLY need to make an order for paper towels, soap, and a Lego set????), only to be stopped by guests every time I'm out on the sales floor.... I was ready to punch someone in the throat.

I told the LOG ETL that I'm "going to need partnership with the leaders this week to get these orders picked," which is Target-speak for "Help me out here, you lazy f*cks."

 

[Kroneru]

Ugh, I don't know about the rest of you, but this week's "save $10 on your $40+ store pickup order" is killing me. Every 10 minutes over the walkie on Sunday as I was trying to get EVERYTHING done alone... "Hey, StackerMistress, there's an FF to get." "Hey, just so you know, there's another FF." "Hey, StackerMistress, there's an order that's about to expire, can you go grab it?" As if I am the ONLY DAMN PERSON WHO CAN GET FLEXIBLE FULFILLMENTS IN THE BUILDING. All the leaders are trained to do it, too!

Combine that with the fact that most of them were either large, bulky items, or multiple items sending me all over the store (did you REALLY need to make an order for paper towels, soap, and a Lego set????), only to be stopped by guests every time I'm out on the sales floor.... I was ready to punch someone in the throat.

I told the LOG ETL that I'm "going to need partnership with the leaders this week to get these orders picked," which is Target-speak for "Help me out here, you lazy f*cks."

*Grabs passed baton*

It wasn't until the 3rd or 5th FF of identical Huggies/Pampers that I thought, "Well wtf?" Then I saw the horror... a sale tag reading "$20 gift card with purchase of two (2) Huggies or Pampers as signed." Dozens upon dozens of picks in the gun that day, dozens...

New MyTime constraints deemed it acceptable to schedule me, the closing BRTM, to 9pm. We close at 11pm. Stay with me everyone. Breath in the rage, breath out the logic.

The so-so BRTM left 2hrs before me and the dead weight BRTM left 15min before I'm scheduled to leave.

So among the hell fire of FFs, price change had to be pulled, big pile of cardboard to crush, set the line, brand up receiving, 12 huge Softline POGS, "Backroom! I have a guest pull! The DPCI is 008-09...", "Backroom! There's an FF pickup in the back! Bring it up?"

By 9pm, line isn't set, cardboard pile still huge, backstock still in receiving, FFs still dropping and being requested, and price change isn't pulled because someone didn't know that has precedence over POGS during my 45... The other two BRTMs that night don't move with the drive to get things done or use inference with most stuff. They should have gotten a lot more done within their timeframe. I stayed 1.5hr past schedule and could not have cared less. If they attempt to reprimand me I'll ask what's worse, pay me the measly $20-$30 more in overtime or leave the BR in complete shambles and burden the LOD (new GS ETL) when doesn't know squat about BR locations or how to work the FF app. I. dare. them.

 

[Quattro]

Oh, there you guys are!!! I was wondering where my fellow BR team members were on this issue.

I didn't work Sunday, but Monday and Tuesday literally all I have done is pick FFs and run them up to guest services. If it's not one, it's the other. I have to put my faith in the fairly new TMs to handle the CAFs while I run around like a headless chicken to get these orders done. I used to check MyFA every 15-20 minutes, but now I'm checking it every 2-3 minutes. If I take my eyes off of it for longer than that, I'll get bombarded with 3-4 orders. At one point Monday, we had 8 orders to be picked. Madness.

Today I had enough time to make a bale, start setting the line, and backstock most of PFresh. In an 8 hour shift, I'm guessing 6.5 hours was spent doing FF related work. It's just this week, right? Please tell me it's just this week.

 

[Leonhart621]

Yup. We're having the same issues. It's because of the sale they have on diapers and paper towels.

I think I did 10 FF yesterday

 

[BigEyedPhish]

I'm a PA and have always wondered what the purpose of hanging any TPCs in the back coolers might serve? I realize it might help with culling the backroom somewhat, but not much.

I have started handing my Short dated TPC labels off to whoever is opening Backroom so they pull any of the TPCed product that goes out that night so it can be challenged to the floor, or pulling them myself

(Which in my opinion helps WAY more than simply hanging signs up in the back).

 

[IHeartCarts]

19 FFs today for myself. Pushed 2 vehicles of CAFs during the 4.5 hours I had.

 

[Kroneru]

10? 19? Try 30-45. That was today. Two days ago was the same amount if not more. The past week or so has been like this.

 

[Noiinteam]

An easy question for the back room experts. What is a priority pull?

 

[sigma7]

Outs and research. Those are priority pulls since they are positively empty spots on the floor (as long as things were zoned and pushed correctly before Instocks scanned). So they should take priority before all other pulls (autofills, pogs, exf, orders, etc). The only other pull that's higher priority than priority?...Flexible Fulfillment.

 

[Noiinteam]

Thank you sigma7.

 

[Kompa]

Are those what the hourly CAFs count as, because we just throw the yellow clips on them.

 

[mrknownothing]

Are those what the hourly CAFs count as, because we just throw the yellow clips on them.

Hourly CAFs are not Priority Pulls, only Outs and Research. CAFs should be a priority once they start dropping (hopefully the Priority Pulls are done by this point), but they're generally marked with green PULLS clips.

 

[Kroneru]

Guest Service lost some IQ points and stopped pushing their button when an order hold location is in the Backroom. I calmly, yet firmly, asked one if the app layout had changed or was the option no longer there. With the sudden boom of orders due to the sale, scrolling through literally forty (40) pages of orders is a pain. "Oh, nothing has changed. I'm doing my job as I've been told and how I've always done it" "But the 'Get for Guest' doesn't read (1) or such anymore" "I don't know then."

-_____-

I run this by my BRTL while he's picking an item in hold and experiencing it himself. He ain't happy. He's going back and forth with GS asking for the guest name, why isn't the (1) popping up, the GSTM accent isn't helping right now... Meanwhile I'm explaining the other, manual way I've been using to pull these orders but he's tuning me out. I walkie GS, "GS, what is the guest name?" "XYZ" "Copy." I scroll through, select name, scan location which is right in front of BRTL, pull items, push complete and hand items to boss. His face when;

Today, the Get for Guest (1) shows up for every order now Why, my BRTL said he went to the GS team and ripped them a new butthole, explaining the challenge is to scroll that damn list on top of our current workload. An unnecessary nuisance right now.

 

[StackerMistress]

New record for a single FF last night: 12 DPCIs, 21 eaches. It was a school supply list. I am scared for August when more people realize that we Target peons can be personal shoppers for their precious darling's every eraser and folder.

It's so much fun wandering through seasonal, on the lovely FF treasure hunt, getting badgered by guests... "Where are the 1" binders?" "I need this specific kind of pencil!" Lady, I don't know where anything is and I'm on such a time crunch right now you have no idea.

It was bad last year during 4th quarter, but at least we had more than one person in the BR at a time. This is just ridiculous. And the worst part is that it seems to be a big success, which means corporate will be doing sales like this more often. Scared for this weekend.

 

[Kroneru]

Largest I've personally pulled was 10 DPCIs, 16 eaches.

 

[sigma7]

My record is 12 DPCIs 26 reaches. Luckily it was all baby food. Although I'm pretty sure that record is getting broken. We've been getting flooded with orders today and yesterday that are entire school supply lists. We're talking 32 picks yesterday and we already had 11 today by 1030

 

[NoRedCards]

Listening to this makes me sooooo glad that I have been MIA for the last several days, and will continue to be for at least several more.....ours started picking up the last time I worked to the point where the poor person was spending time chasing them than doing her actual backroom stuff.....