Shelf Fillers
Fill up shelves and display areas in stores and supermarkets.
Morning restock before opening
You are a shelf filler at a neighbourhood supermarket, restocking aisles before the doors open and again in the afternoon. It is 6am. The doors open at seven, two pallets are waiting, and a delivery driver is asking where to leave a third.
Choose what you would do. Then see what happens. There are often good reasons for each choice.
There's a puddle of milk in front of the fridge. The doors open in an hour and I have a pallet to finish. Can you mop it up? I'll be back to help after I'm done here.
Put a sign down, clear the spill and wait to ask where the milk came from
The floor is clean and safe, but a carton in the fridge is still leaking. You sorted the puddle but not the cause. A spill is often a symptom.
Leave it for the cleaner who arrives at seven
A colleague with a trolley skids on the spill and drops a tray of eggs. The aisle takes twenty minutes to clear before opening. Waiting for the cleaner turned a quick fix into a bigger one.
Put a wet floor sign up first, then clean it up and check the fridge
The sign goes down, the spill is cleaned and you find a split carton in the fridge and remove it. Nobody slips. Warning people first, then cleaning, then checking where it came from.
Excuse me, love. I'm looking for the gluten-free pasta, and I can't see it anywhere. I'm in a bit of a hurry because my husband is waiting in the car. Could you help me?
Stop what you are doing and walk her to the shelf
It takes forty seconds and she thanks you. She also mentions that a sign near the pasta has fallen off, which you fix. Helping a customer is part of the job, not an interruption to it.
Point to the aisle number and keep working, because your pallet is waiting
Mrs Doyle finds the aisle but not the shelf, and comes back looking confused. You were quick, but walking her there would have taken half a minute.
Tell her to ask at the customer service desk
The desk is not open yet, and Mrs Doyle leaves without the pasta. A shopper who can't find something may not return. Sending someone away is rarely the best answer.
The new stock for the specials aisle has arrived and the sign says the price has changed, but the barcode label on the shelf is still the old one. We open in ten minutes. What do you think we should do?
Say it's probably fine, because the till will sort it out
The first customers pay the wrong amount, and some complain at the till. The shop has to refund and apologise. A mismatch between shelf and till is something to fix before the doors open.
Ask Greg to check the price update and hold the stock until it's sorted
Greg checks and finds the new labels are in the office. A colleague fetches them and you fix the shelf. The doors open with the right price. Raising a mismatch early prevents a bigger one.
Stick the new price sign on top of the old label yourself
The shelf looks right, but you haven't confirmed the price and the till could be different. Doing it yourself without checking is a guess that looks like a fix.
How it went
The doors open, the shelves are full and the pallets are flattened. Shelf filling is quick, practical and full of small checks, and your work is the first thing customers see. Do you think you'd like the rhythm of getting a store ready every day?
This is a simplified, fictional situation to help you explore. It is not professional instruction or a test of your ability.
Case study: The tin that was a day out of date
A fictional case set in a neighbourhood supermarket, in the hour before opening and again during the afternoon restock.
The situation
Salma was a shelf filler at a supermarket. During an afternoon restock she pulled the old tins forward to put the new ones behind them, as the routine says. At the back of a row of tinned tomatoes she noticed one tin with a date that had passed the day before. A promotion sign over the shelf said they were on special. The supervisor, Greg, was on a break and Salma was alone in the aisle.
What they did
Salma removed the tin and checked the others along the row. She found two more with the same date. She took them to the back room, wrote the details on the markdown sheet and told Greg when he returned. He checked the stock room for the same batch and found a box that had been missed during a delivery check.
How it turned out
The expired stock was removed before a single customer bought it. Greg adjusted the receiving check and thanked Salma at the start of the next shift. Salma says she now looks at dates every time her hands are on a shelf.
What would you do?
- What routine habit helped Salma find the tin?
- Why might it feel awkward to remove a tin that's on special?
- How would you tell Greg if you weren't sure it was a mistake?