it sounds like a good deal to me. just keep your head down til you are off probation then you can make waves if you want to. You will see this often in union shops. They just don't care. and when its break time its break time. They don't care if there is a line of customers waiting ITS BREAK TIME! Its not for everyone some shops will do a better job following the rules than others.. learn what you can in this one then ask for a transfer if things don't change to your liking. Stick with what you know is right you can't get in trouble for doing the right thing right? If you get threaten for doing the right thing well i would just wait til i am off probation but maybe you should mention it to the meat manager about the meat on the floor. However if he really doesn't care then just ignore it til you are off probation.
He is powerless to reprimand the violater anyway. Everything has to go through the union. Its rediculous and the primary reason i will never work for a chain store again. but look on the bright side after you finish probation just join the union and you are pretty secure and you can go and drop things on the floor too and not worry.
But if you plan to make a career out of working in the meat business ask for a transfer to meat dept with a better reputation and in the mean time try not to pick up too many bad habits from these people because they will show when you try to work with someone who does it right.
-- Edited by fdarn on Sunday 28th of July 2013 09:55:52 PM
Today was my first day at Kroger as a meat clerk I cant say I was impressed by it. Ive a few gripes as an employee. Ive never worked in a meat dept before.
The first one is pretty mild maybe it was by error or by purpose to test me but everyone disappeared for 20 mins and left me on my own without saying anything like cover the counter Im no idiot and the job is easy but Id have never left any new person alone on their first day.
The second one is mild too I was asked to hose down the saws and grinder I wasnt told how or what do however it was easy and I knew from cleaning cheese slicers what to do nevertheless no explaination at all. Another point I asked the other clerks if the manager tomorrow could get me rubberboots or waterproof legging the next day as I didnt want to work in a chilled dept with wet clothes to me thats necessary PPE , I was laughed at and told Kroger dont care. Is it unreasonable for me to ask for industry standard white rubberboots and waterproof legging.
Now comes the biggie a customer asked for 2 new york strip steaks and they only had 1 at the counter so the clerk went and got a pack of uncut steaks to show me how so he plopped the chunk of beef on a small 6 inch ledge and I said shouldnt you be doing that in the cutting room with a glove.He said they dont have any Kroger dont care he fiddled with it hacking at it on a ledge he dropped the end piece on the floor.
I basically said Id refuse he said Id lose my job Im on probation.
Overall Id sum the place up as shoddy, lack of care,unsafe and full of people going thorough the motions.
The plus side is Fresh Market have offered me fulltime meat clerk with no experience starting $100 more pw.
Yes Im going to learn what I can for the brief time I will be there Ill be taking The Fresh Market job to me the Kroger job will be just practice dealing with customers not that I need practice being friendly.
Another thing that I cant say impressed me was finding out out much I was getting paid, during the induction classes last week I asked several times only to be told the meat manager would tell me I wasnt expecting minimum wage and I didnt like the way he walked away when I was asking how long would I be paid that and what is the usual timescale for hourly pay to go up.
I wouldnt report him anyway for cutting without a glove. He is on minimum wage my father said many a year ago never pass remarks on another mans work he might have a family to feed, so the company hotline to grass on people dont cut much muster on me. Id hope that young lad listened to me and realised safety is for him not sales he could have said they ran out.
Ive been a supervisor in a few fields of industry where lots of people were paid low wages my loyalty was always to people under me id no qualms on taking the blame for someone who cost the company 75k gbp at the press of a button. So id never tramp on anyone.
Maybe my mind is stuck on doing a job right and in supervisor mode.
They also had a electric grill type cooker to cook hotdogs which i was surprised at because it was a store and there was a thread here on eating and drinking in the workplace Im ok with that however I wasnt ok with the bloke walking through the cutting room and into the chiller and throwing the bones from the drumstick on the floor. A bin 2 yards away.
Also 5 mins after starting I was took through the cutting room to the chill room to throw boxes out and first thing I see is 2 blue wooden food pallets standing up on their end. Shoddy health and safety would they pay me if i clipped on with my heel and it banged my leg and I had to take time off.
Thats basic safety for warehouse work and goodsin/out.
Even if I hadnt got a better offer my view is not only am I on probation with Kroger but they are on probation with me, which is my view with any company.
Unfortunately, it is not just Kroger, virtually all major chain stores have taken the spirit of work ethic out of the managers hands by tying them behind their backs, with policies in place to protect the new hires. There are still great shops out there with managers who stick there neck out to protect the trade and their own work ethic. In my own opinion and experience with Kroger they are letting the meat dept fail in hopes of better margins for pre-pack meat. For some reason in their thought process the local meat cutter or butcher has become obsolete and overpaid.
Yep I have taken The Fresh Market job Im helping set the store up at the moment they are opening 4 new stores here all refitted throughout with all new equipment fixtures etc.
They are still looking for a meat manager in the stores in Houston (according to the store manager today 8/7/13) they have applications online or if I can ask them for a contact number.
-- Edited by irishdude on Wednesday 7th of August 2013 08:29:36 PM
J-Mansell is right-meat cutters are seen as an enemy and chains can't wait to be rid of them as Walmart did. At Food Lion, we only cut beef and boneless pork loins. We are not valued at all. The Fresh Market is pretty good- did 4 years there-go for it. Good luck
I have to admit, having left the trade in 1995, that I am not familiar with the term "meat clerk". We had Journeymen, Class B cutters (lower paid and could not break beef), and weigher/wrappers.
I went from a position as a meat dept. manager at an independent, in a union shop, to a position as a Journeyman cutter at large chain, in a union shop, because it paid 50 cents/hour more than I was making. At the independent, the union was paid off, so it was more like non-union, except you got to pay union dues.
As the new guy, with no seniority, I was treated like sh** at the big chain. Let me also say that I never saw anyone ever, with waterproof leggings, and there was only one pair of boost for the dept to be used when blitzing (pressure washing) the dept. 3 times a day. While it was not on the first day, within a week or two I had a guy place a 12"steak knife against my ribs and tell me "slow down, you are making us look bad". That's just the way it was. Before I took the job I told the HR dept that my wife was expecting our first child and I might have to miss work and was told no problem. However at the store level I was told if you miss any time or are going to be late during your probation period, don't even bother to call, because you are terminated. Their reasoning was "if you miss time when you are on probation, what will you be like once you have union protection? Well it came to pass that I had to call out to take my wife to the hospital. I was working the 10 PM to 8:30 AM shift because I was low man. That was a brutal shift because you were given a production list a mile long and as the only cutter there were very accountable for completing it.
So I called out, or attempted to. My meat Mger told me that if I did not come in I was terminated. He said that women have babies every day and my wife could take a cab to the hospital. Well I offered to come in once I knew everything was ok but that was not good enough so he told me that I was fired.
AS luck would have it, midnight began my 61st day on the job so I was a union member. The union saved my job for that reason and since the 10 PM to midnight part of my shift was over-time and thus voluntary, they could not fire me for missing that. So when people criticize unions I still have that memory and appreciation.
That said, I can also say that for my entire 28 year career, every single one of my local union presidents, ended up i federal prison for corruption.
I have been with kroger for 6 years and a meat manager for 5. i have ran 4 depts and helped in manyothers. there are a lot of lazy people out there now a days and with the union it is damn near impossible to git rid of them. no telling how much money they are loosing with people like that. just hang in there past your 45 days and then u can have more say and rite the wrongs without bein worried about loosing your job. Good luck
That said, I can also say that for my entire 28 year career, every single one of my local union presidents, ended up i federal prison for corruption.
Jim
What did they do? What kind of corruption
When I think of union reps and presidents being corrupt, I think of them being on the wrong side. They're the enemy. Maybe they get paid under the table by the companies to work against us. A weaker contract. Not fight for us in a dispute or pretend to be on our side and then lose the fight on purpose. Things like that.
Like a bad divorce lawyer who's really supporting the other spouse. Or a 1950s small town Alabama (or California, etc.) Sheriff who's a KKK member on the side. That's what I think of SOME union reps.BTW, I think union reps get at least 1.5 X more $$$ than meat managers. If only they got the same as a managern (our same contrract), they'd fight harder for us.
while I don't remember the specifics, one first hand experience I had overheard was our local President telling my Meat Product Mgr that someone had called the union ot report that someone had called the union anonymously to report that some people were working off the clock an he asked if my boss wanted to listen to the recording to see if he recognized the voice.
Another case was were several dozen members formed the "rank and file" committee to try to clean up the local and oust the leadership. They eventually all got fired from their supermarket jobs or "gross incompetence".
while I don't remember the specifics, one first hand experience I had overheard was our local President telling my Meat Product Mgr that someone had called the union ot report that someone had called the union anonymously to report that some people were working off the clock an he asked if my boss wanted to listen to the recording to see if he recognized the voice.
Another case was were several dozen members formed the "rank and file" committee to try to clean up the local and oust the leadership. They eventually all got fired from their supermarket jobs or "gross incompetence".
Not as dramatic as I thought it was going to be. I was thinking they were all probably connected to the mob like the teamsters were and it was a matter of extortion and racketeering of maybe they had a couple people who were dirty rats "offed". Oh well. It was a good guess right?
There was that too, I think. When the union first got into the first independent I worked for all the folks picketing were not employees, not one of them. The union's business agents, organizers, and VPs all drove Cadillacs and sure dressed like mobsters, in sunglasses, $1000 suit and $200 shoes (and this was 1970 dollars. Since none of the employees wanted the union we were all surprised when the owner signed the union contract. The story I heard was they showed up at the owner's home the night before and made him an offer he could not refuse. As a ****y teenager I had some strong discussions with these guys but in the end I had 30 days to join the union "voluntarily" or I was out the door.
The details are fuzzy now but later I knew two Meat department managers who were shot to death. Later on, when I worked for the big chain (same union) one of our vice presidents was shot to death. Google Robert Wunderle for details. To this day it is still unsolved.
I've worked for Kroger (smiths) for almost seven years, and most of the time a meat manager, so i definitely know what you're up against. Kroger gives their apprentice meat cutters only six months of training, and then they are so called "journeyman"meat cutters. They also give their new hire meat cutters only 16 hours of training of the intense Kroger way of business. If you have worked for Kroger, you learn very quickly that our business depends strictly on the paperwork. We have to abide by the cutting tool and have explanation of why we over produce or under produce to what the target is on the paper. I think this really limits cutters from pushing for sales.
On the plus side, Kroger pays well, and since I'm union, insurance is cheap, so I'm happy. I only wish i could think outside the box without being crucified by not going 100% to the plan.
