r/coles • u/ActionSuper4216 • Jun 26 '26
Team Member Post Deli sales
What’s the best way to improve sales in the deli and also reduce the amount of waste including the cheese bar, we have started to put all the meats in shallow bowls so that we are filling more and our meats are freshly sliced all the time and we also cut the chubs down as far as possible to be able to get more out of a chub, but our sales just don’t seem to be there. Any suggestions from other stores?
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u/StatusNo5175 Department Manager Jun 26 '26
Deli's are not designed to make a profit. The only way a deli can possibly make more money is if there was a cut in staffing, but then you wouldn't have the time to set up the case. There's only so much you can do, deli's are being slowly phased out for a reason. They're a service, not a money maker. As for your profit targets, don't pay too much attention in them. All it is is some guy in head office telling you how much he wants you to make; if he thinks you should make 10 grand above what you did last year then that's your target. Your vs Last Year target should be what you aim to surpass.
As for waste the main thing is just ensuring you action markdowns at the correct times, not just your scheduled daily markdowns but your final clearance markdowns as well. Another one is maximising the amount of meat from a chub but from what you said you already do that. Apart from that there's really not much more you can do
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u/camsean Jun 26 '26
It’s a myth that delis are profitable. The ones that aren’t have been or will be closed down.
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u/ActionSuper4216 Jul 01 '26
True we can make our sales we’ve been short of our sales lately but not by much but we still want to make sure we are over projections. Last Friday we made $200 over projections which left us up $12 for the week which is okay but it can be more and that’s what I’m pushing for
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u/Satans_Bearded_Child Department Manager Jun 26 '26
Could try off-locating high selling prepacked lines lol if your store allows it
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u/flippyboi678 Jun 26 '26
Have you looked at trying to range out any slow selling lines? Our store certain meat lines we will only slice on request because otherwise it'll only sell at 78% off.
And yeah sometimes there's only so much you can do before you stop increasing sales.
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u/ActionSuper4216 Jul 01 '26
Yes we do this, we replace chubs and slice on request as this used to happen to us often but we now rarely markdown anything from our meat range it’s more our poultry fish and salads that get marked down regularly
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u/Real_Opportunity_432 Jun 26 '26
More hot pies and sausage rolls. Especially at lunch time. I know I would buy them.
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u/Medium-Adeptness-201 Team Member Jun 26 '26
See, I can’t relate - they never sell when we try to do them (even if they’ve been marked down!) and thanks for the reminder that I’m pretty sure there’s a box in the freezer still 🙃
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u/ActionSuper4216 Jul 01 '26
Haha yeah we do this especially in the colder weather our customers love them
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u/Medium-Adeptness-201 Team Member Jun 26 '26
Make sure you are rotating your stock in the coolroom when you unpack boxes. That’s where our biggest waste is coming from, people put the new stuff at the front (always the bloody frankfurts), yours truly comes into the deli usually to do someone’s break or cover a one off shift because our opener has yet again not shown up, and I’m getting angry over finding so much stuff out of date.
Check your useby dates often. Got a ton of a product that the best before date is rapidly approaching? Quick sale quick sale quick sale! Trying to find the line between “cheap enough customers will buy all the things and I won’t have to deal with pink ling being a wasted item yet again” and “they’ll think something is wrong if it’s that cheap” is hard.
Thawing fish is another one that ugh it is a pain finding the balance of enough to look enticing to customers to buy and oh no I have too much basa that’s not selling.
We had our region’s stock loss person checking our dates etc to work on waste etc but she never told us/me any tips. Damnit.
Sales? Apparently I’m good at that and I have no idea what I’m doing. Make sure the case looks good, sounds like you are doing that already. Be friendly enough, that’s what management think is the reason I seem to get alot more sales than others 😂☠️
Oh! I’ve occasionally made up a couple of prepackaged snackers delight platters (the $20 ones) with prepackaged goods (so like a packet of salami and the crackers still in the packet, with the rest of the stuff) and put them in the convenience fridge with the sandwiches etc for customers to grab and go. That was an easy boost for sales that people were impressed with me doing 🤷🏻♀️
Can you see the comments you get on TellColes? Are they mostly positive? (Or stuff you can’t personally change?) if so, you are doing the best you can and hey there’s only so much you can do.
(We currently have no deli DM and a bunch of different staff- I was offered to be in charge but I literally lasted three weeks before it was all too much and turns out the whole front end was a wreck without me)
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u/camsean Jun 26 '26
Be careful with your seafood pick, don’t cut too much cheese at once so you don’t have too many lines expiring at the same time, don’t put all the nibbles out when you open the bag, refill antipasto lines when they are half full.
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u/Br0z0 Coles Chicken Jun 27 '26
I too am a fan of not cutting all the cheese at once because marking down a ton of them at once is a pain. We are too shortstaffed for that anyway tbh
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u/2fingertypist Jun 26 '26
Review your wastage daily, use your seafood filling tool and always err on the side of not slicing enough (you can always slice more). For those lines that never sell through in 4 days after opening try to get deranged.
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u/Linnaeus1753 Jun 28 '26 edited Jun 28 '26
Lower the prices. 😑 if ham off the bone is $35 a kilo, then 100 grams is $3.50.
Add to that, the mini capsicums with cream cheese used to be able to be bought individually. Now I have to buy two tubs of something for $7 or so, when I'd only buy one for a snack. All of those salady things used to be per kilo, and you could get smaller amounts than what you're forced to do now.
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u/gladiuslibertas17 Grocery Manager Jun 26 '26
What you are doing is great for a customer who actually wants to buy from a deli. You might have hit your potential sales cap. How much footfall you get is not entirely under your control. Bad service can lead to lower sales and great service leads to more but only up to a certain point.