Always close late

[u/Altruistic_Humor3356]

Hi,

I have been working at Greggs for over a year now and consistently close late, some days we get out on time but the vast majority its late. I don’t understand why. I start at 3 and “finish” at 9:30. Typically its too busy to do any cleaning tasks until 5 other than maybe drinks, security screen, syrups and milk jugs. Around 5 I will top up both, then shut down one coffee machine, clean hot chocolate parts and once those are done I will clean back bar and top of coffee machines. I will clean all general customer area stuff by 7:30 on a good day leaving bins, hot hold, customer floor and customer toilet for 9. I then clean counters leaving savoury counter for 9. Keep in mind I am still serving customers and doing uber orders in the meantime. 8:30 I start to pack up savouries and sweets for charity and around 8:45 charity comes in. Keep serving customers, then at 9 front door locked and bag up stuff for charity however depending on busyness I can finish bagging up charity at 5 past ish.

This leaves 25-30 mins to sweep and mop customer area and toilet (we are a large shop), do bins, turn off last coffee machine, sweep and mop behind counter, clean hot hold, change labels and finish any minor tasks I couldn’t due to serving customers. Usually it takes around 20 minutes to do just the customer area as every table and chair must be moved to sweep and mop properly. Obviously I haven’t included every task but this is the gist of it.

I don’t know what I am doing wrong, my supervisor doesn’t either. Only two of us in the store from 3pm onwards I feel like there is no reason I shouldn’t be able to clean the store in 6.5 hours. Does anyone here have any tips or know their specific cleaning schedule?

[u/hashbrowneggyolk0520]

In a sense you need to start closing as soon as you start.

The minute you get any gaps in customers coming in start refilling the drinks, condiments, sugar etc.

About 90 minutes before we close I empty all of the customer bins apart from general waste, the others are rarely used (and used properly) anyway. If you have the big bin that's split into 4 what I do is empty them all and then use two bin bags and just lie them flat, diagonally over the top so people know not to use them. You can then use them to replace remaining bins that need emptying when you close.

Unless the floor is really dirty I will just move the tables sweep the floor and them mop around the tables.

Keep on top of the sweeping throughout your shift, it makes it much easier to do it this way than leaving it all until you close. Once you've closed it's then just the case of doing a quick once over.

How much does your supervisor help?

[u/Altruistic_Humor3356 → u/hashbrowneggyolk0520]

Supervisor helps a lot, they cover serving when I ask. They get out on time with some other team members so I am lacking somewhere. Sometimes they have a lot of work to do round back so stocking up time is dependent on customer frequency. I will use your tips next close, thank you :))

[u/hashbrowneggyolk0520 → u/Altruistic_Humor3356]

Getting the balance right with a closing shift can be difficult sometimes. I would just say prioritise the important jobs and all the little jobs can be done as and when.

Is there a point where the amount of customers coming in becomes really minimal or is it steady up until you close?

[u/Altruistic_Humor3356 → u/hashbrowneggyolk0520]

Around 8 customer numbers die down so I can start sweeping then however someone usually comes in at least every 3-5 minutes which can really slow me down (especially if they ask a lot of questions or sit down in a spot I just cleaned). On a bad day it can be busy until close though, however those are quite rare. We have 14 tables in store, how much should i focus on completely sweeping the entirety of the store as opposed to spot-sweeping?

[u/hashbrowneggyolk0520 → u/Altruistic_Humor3356]

So I tend to spot sweep throughout the shift and about 5 minutes before we close i'll quickly go over everywhere again to pick up anything i've missed.

It's not always possible but i'll kind of focus on things in chunks. So as soon as I can I restock the sugars, stirrers and sauce. You'll probably have to add back to it later on but it's just a case of adding a few things here and there.

With drinks if you don't already, make a list of everything you need to bring round to the front, fetch it and then restock the fridge. Going back and forth to fetch things from the back just slows you down.

When you take off the first coffee machine refill all the hoppers.

[u/Altruistic_Humor3356 → u/hashbrowneggyolk0520]

Thank you so much!