21% sounds good to me. I have been out of the trade for a few years now, but if I remember right my profit percentage was usually between 18 and 25%. I definitely do not see 30% in a retail setting. Retail is notorious for having low profit margins.
I'm getting about 27 to 29 percent. Funny thing though, they don't set GP targets. They seem more focused on shrink % and Freshness, friendliness and being in stock.
I'm getting about 27 to 29 percent. Funny thing though, they don't set GP targets. They seem more focused on shrink % and Freshness, friendliness and being in stock.
I have to agree that in my time the shrink % was probably the highest priority also.
Sprouts wants above 25, but it all comes from chicken and value added. There is no profit in beef anymore. Keeping your beef p.o.g. and freshness and getting 2 days before pulling for meatloaf. Don't do market ground beef and limited on what we can mark down.
At Pathmark, shrink was also the main focus but if you did not also hit the GP% targets you would definitely hear about it!
kbraker510 wrote:
I'm getting about 27 to 29 percent. Funny thing though, they don't set GP targets. They seem more focused on shrink % and Freshness, friendliness and being in stock.
We were REQUIRED to mark down ground beef after 4 hours in the case and chill pack chicken 24 hours before the sell by date. That was true even though we specified a 5 day sell by on chill pack chicken even though our main competition (Acme) put 12 days on chill pack poultry. The idea was to give the consumer maximum product life after they bought it. Not sure how successful those good intentions were considering Pathmark went bankrupt last November and Acme is still going.
machine wrote:
Sprouts wants above 25, but it all comes from chicken and value added. There is no profit in beef anymore. Keeping your beef p.o.g. and freshness and getting 2 days before pulling for meatloaf. Don't do market ground beef and limited on what we can mark down.
We were REQUIRED to mark down ground beef after 4 hours in the case and chill pack chicken 24 hours before the sell by date. That was true even though we specified a 5 day sell by on chill pack chicken even though our main competition (Acme) put 12 days on chill pack poultry. The idea was to give the consumer maximum product life after they bought it. Not sure how successful those good intentions were considering Pathmark went bankrupt last November and Acme is still going.
machine wrote:
Sprouts wants above 25, but it all comes from chicken and value added. There is no profit in beef anymore. Keeping your beef p.o.g. and freshness and getting 2 days before pulling for meatloaf. Don't do market ground beef and limited on what we can mark down.
Just about every Meat Dept. I worked in with the exception of one, we marked down all grinds and cuts the day they went out of date and rewrapped the chicken if it was still fresh. we were trying to get as much time out of the product as we could before pulling it or marking it down, thus alienating customers who want a fresh product. I threw so much meat away my last two years, that I knew something had to change in how handle close dates, but you know management doesn't like to listen to us lowly meat cutters. Their remedy was to cut less and have an almost empty meat case every day, but boy were they pissed when it got busy from an unexpected snow scare.
-- Edited by fdarn on Monday 11th of April 2016 07:54:36 PM
Re-wrapping chicken? At Pathmark that was a terminable offense! I knew a few meat managers who were fired for that! Our chill pack poultry had to be marked down in the original chill pack packaging 24 hours before the sell-by showing the original packaging and sell by date. If they found anything in generic store wrapped packaging you'd lose your job. That was fine with me as long as the rules were clear (and they were). It did make me a better manager and the customers got the best, freshest product.
fdarn wrote:
jimhenry2000 wrote:
We were REQUIRED to mark down ground beef after 4 hours in the case and chill pack chicken 24 hours before the sell by date. That was true even though we specified a 5 day sell by on chill pack chicken even though our main competition (Acme) put 12 days on chill pack poultry. The idea was to give the consumer maximum product life after they bought it. Not sure how successful those good intentions were considering Pathmark went bankrupt last November and Acme is still going.
machine wrote:
Sprouts wants above 25, but it all comes from chicken and value added. There is no profit in beef anymore. Keeping your beef p.o.g. and freshness and getting 2 days before pulling for meatloaf. Don't do market ground beef and limited on what we can mark down.
Just about every Meat Dept. I worked in with the exception of one, we marked down all grinds and cuts the day they went out of date and rewrapped the chicken if it was still fresh. we were trying to get as much time out of the product as we could before pulling it or marking it down, thus alienating customers who want a fresh product. I threw so much meat away my last two years, that I knew something had to change in how handle close dates, but you know management doesn't like to listen to us lowly meat cutters. Their remedy was to cut less and have an almost empty meat case every day, but boy were they pissed when it got busy from an unexpected snow scare.
-- Edited by fdarn on Monday 11th of April 2016 07:54:36 PM
Pathmark's approach sounds like a good way to earn the customer's trust. At Giant we marked down grinds 6 hours after they were put in the case and chicken a day early. Giant was a big corporation like Pathmark so that would explain a lot. Most of my career was in independents. We would open packaged chicken, sniff it and if it smelled fresh we put it back out for 2 days, we did that with some pork cuts too. 2 days later if they still didn't sell it often went to the kitchen to cook, but usually straight into the garbage.
I wanted to adopt a system where we started marking things down a percentage 24 hours early. My feelings were if we could move it out sooner we could replace it with fresh looking meat and always have a nice fresh looking case and increase volume, because costumers don't want to buy when they know everything is close dated or already re-wrapped. I was very customer oriented and extremely frustrated with management and owner's lack of consideration to the customer's feelings. they thought the money was in pushing the product for as long as possible and I felt that only alienated customers. The store I left in 2010 went out of business one year later. The store I left in 2013 cut the meat dept. out 2 months later and put in a subway station.
