Of Drumsticks and Clock-Ticks...

So we're entering the second week of one of our rare two-week flyers at work. Two-week ads tend to coincide with holidays: brave is the grocery chain that starts a new flyer on the Saturday of a long weekend. Two or three times a year, though, they extend a flyer over two weeks for no readily discernable reason.
We love these times.
For one thing, the second week is invaribly slower than the first, affording a chance to catch our breath. For another, an elongated sale allows the leeway to over-order and gradually deplete the stock...or, on the other hand, plenty of time to secure stock should we not order enough right off the bat.

BLACK DIAMOND CHEESE BARS, 600g, $5.47 (regular $7.47)

It wasn't all that long ago that $5.47 was the regular price. If you've done any grocery shopping over the past two years, you've probably noticed that the price of cheese has skyrocketed. Many, many people have grilled me on this--grilled cheese, get it?--and I don't have much of an answer for them. The retails have gone up because our costs have gone up, plain and simple. You'd doubtless be surprised to learn that most items in the dairy department lose the store money, that is, they cost us more than we sell them for. Cheese, by and large, we break even on, until it goes on sale, at which point we lose a mint.
I've been burned before on cheese. Every time it goes on sale, everybody and his poodle comes in, and I never seem to order enough. So this time I went a little nuts on it to start off--only it turned out that my idea of going nuts was just about perfect. Haven't run out yet.

Nestle Premium Novelties, $3.77 (regular $5.47)

Now, this is what the flyer says, right there on the front page. But it shows just one variety of Drumsticks. Of course, I never saw the flyer until long after my order with Nestle was due in.
Oh, well, it didn't matter anyway, because last weekend was cold. The temperature was well below freezing, the windchill was a number best not thought of, in short, it was colder than...a Drumstick. I scoffed when I found out these were on sale in March. Normally, we run these things Victoria Day weekend at $2.97 and at that time of year I bring in five or six pallets of them just for Saturday and Sunday. But March? Winter? Brrr? Who'd want to buy ice cream novelties when it's snowing outside?
Nobody, as it turned out, except, well, everybody in the effing city. There was a goddamn stampede on Saturday morning and we were out by noon, leading to insults and threats galore. Yes, threats. We've had people threaten lawsuits, people shake fists at us, people get right up in our faces and scream at us...and we're in what's supposed to be a nice, upper-middle-class area. Makes me really sad for the folks at stores in Toronto. One of these days somebody's going to pull a knife...or a gun.
But you just stand there and take it, the people saying we should change our name to Zellers, the people questioning our competence, the people--they always have full carts, oddly enough!--who complain bitterly that "nothing they want is in stock."
Gee, sorry, guys. You probably don't want to know just how poorly Drumsticks sell in the winter. Oh, there's nothing wrong with them--they're good for a year and my ice cream doors are kept below minus-20--but they have been in there a while. How was I supposed to guess summer would break out in everybody's head at the same time?

And, of course, tomorrow's supposed to be 14 degrees outside, or something like that. Luckily, the neighbourhood has emptied out for March Break...and this is the second week of the flyer. But then again, we're running a two-day sale this weekend on shrimp, regularly $12.99 at $8.97...the way people in this city go mad for their shrimp, I bet a few have actually put off their vacations so that they could stock up. Freaks.

I guess what I'm trying to say, here, is that customer volumes and preferences are inherently unpredictable, and I do wish people would stop and consider that before they bawl me out. I'm only doing my best...it's all I can do.

So I'm enjoying my peaceful, tranquil, completely-unlike-a-Friday-night Friday night and leafing through the most recent edition of Canadian Grocer magazine. (Does that sound geeky or what?) Canadian Grocer comes out every two months and it has a wealth of information in it covering every department in the store. I've learned a lot perusing its pages.
Tonight I learned that in the 1960s, 90% of all grocery purchasing decisions were made in the home. Today, 70% of purchasing decisions are made in the store.
In case that didn't jump out at you (my eyeballs still have the scars!), let me rephrase it: impulse purchases comprise almost three quarters of the average grocery bill.

Once again, the Breadner family proves itself to be from another planet. Our grocery list rarely varies. Everything is individually costed out long before grocery day (Wednesday in this house), with a small buffer on each item to cover tax and whatever few impulse items we do buy. It amazes me how many fellow employees shop nearly every day of the week. For us that would be a recipe for insolvency. But hey, if it works for them...

I also learned that the average dinner prep time has decreased by eleven minutes over the past ten years. It now stands at 32 minutes. Given the insane number of frozen entrees we sell, I was surprised it was so long.
I'm living in the wrong time, I just know I am. Everybody's in such a frantic race--if you believe Canadian Grocer, it seems nobody has time to do something as simple as a grocery list anymore, and most people surveyed wanted dinner to take even less time to prepare. I hope these folks are all happy with their rush-rush lives. But somehow, I doubt it.