The Convenience Store - the corner shop. Everyone's got one, quite local to them, usually on the corner of the road. Always there, always open, except when you run out of milk at 2am or the cat's just come in and wants feeding, then they're closed. We take them for granted, and then moan when they close down because the new supermarket that opened recently that's about 2 miles away, has taken all the custom, and they can't afford to compete and stay open.
It's not easy to run a little corner shop - ask anyone who's tried it, and they'll tell you all about it. I know, I manage one. Let me give you an example of a typical working day. Do I hear you say "That's boring"? Not likely. Just try this for size.
The shop opens from 7am until 10pm at night, every day, seven days a week, all year round. There's no rest for the wicked - just that I'd like the opportunity to be wicked once in a while. :-)
Everyone has one of those days when nothing goes right. You know the kind, every time you open your mouth, you put your foot in it, and say the wrong thing, making matters worse, or, anything you touch, goes wrong, etc. I've just had a week of this. One day is bad enough, but a whole week!!!
It started with a simple telephone message to inform me that a new cigarette gantry would be installed, three days before new software would also be installed onto the computer and tills. A training course would be arranged in advance to learn how to use the new software. Simple? NO! Some people are resistant to change, and the staff were no exception, especially regarding the computer. They range from "I-don't-like-or-trust-computers" to "I-don't-want-to-learn-anything-new", with a minority of "I'll-have-a-go,-but-don't-blame-me-if-it-goes-wrong", with a sprinkle of "Don't-let-me-near-it,-I'll-break-it" type.
Installing the new cigarette gantry sounded as if it would be a simple job. Remove all stock from the old one, remove the fixture and replace with the new one, refill according to new plan. Except - that this could not be done whilst the shop was open. It was to be done at night. The manager (guess who?) would be the one to have to stay all night, as they were responsible for the stock, and all products would have to be kept in a secure place, until completion of the work, and then restocked. Still sounded fairly easy, except for the "working through the night" bit. The rota was arranged the week before so I would only be on duty from 7pm on that night, having the following day as my day off. All staff seemed happy with the arrangements, and preparations were made to reduce the ordering so there was as little stock as possible to move. So far, so good.
Then word came from on high (well, upper management, anyway), that the fitters would be arriving at 9pm - one hour before closing time - and would leave if the stock was not removed, enabling a quick start. It was arranged that the staff would keep stock to a minimum in that area during the day and an extra person was rostered on to assist in final stock removal and to fetch any products which customers required during the last hour. No panic - yet.
However, on the night, they arrived an hour early, and the stock was not completely removed! We rushed around and emptied the shelves, not only the gantry but behind the counter and the fixtures surrounding the area, as they contained bottles of wine, and I wanted the minimum of breakages and subsequent stock loss. Luckily, they were content to start building the new gantry whilst they waited as it came flat packed, ready to assemble. Was it possible to use the warehouse for that purpose, they asked? In a word - no. The warehouse is about as large as the average lounge and contains stock which will not fit on the shelves. Three workmen would be building the gantry which would measure 8' x 6' x 2'. On examination of the warehouse, they had to agree that I did have a point. So they decided to erect it in the shop, closing two aisles in the process. They did offer to pass any products to customers, which, considering they didn't have a clue where everything was, only added to the pandemonium.
Total mayhem ensued for the next two hours, with three workmen building the gantry, with about 200 customers wanting items fetching from either the closed aisles or the warehouse. Madness. We had to close the door for five minutes whilst the old gantry was removed. This was very heavy and they were worried that it might topple over and hurt someone. Once that was removed, we could continue trading. Sales analysis reveals that trade was not as good as it should have been on that night. I wonder why? Total products removed that evening included spirits, cigarettes, some wine, sherries, medicines and batteries, with the subsequent fetching of these items from the back of the store. Many people don't ask if they can't spot what they want, so sales obviously drop. By the time we were able to close the door, we were already fit to drop.
I had had the foresight to warn the residents of the flat above the shop that there may be some noise through the night, and apologised in advance for any disturbance to sleep that they may experience. Just as well, as hammers, drills and saws were used, as well as some "blue" language. Things did not go too well for the workmen, as you can tell. The old gantry, being made of metal, was heavy and awkward, and required three of them to struggle with it to manoeuvre it from it's place. Hard enough, but made worse by having to work in a 3' wide area, reducing to 2' on exit. Tiles were lifted from the floor, ceiling tiles removed for electric work, and a gaping hole left by the old gantry made the area look atrocious. As a bonus, we found around £6 in loose change which filled the charity box. Otherwise, there was nothing we could do further to assist, after cleaning in the area. Two of us sat, bored and tired, whilst the workmen struggled on.
Around 1am, the chargehand announced they had a problem, and would need to make a plinth to sit the new gantry on. Could they saw some wood in the rear of the shop? Again, the warehouse was scrutinised, and found to be too constrictive. Then it would have to be cut outside in the carpark! I envisaged handsaws, due to the lateness of the hour, but the work needed to be finished quickly, so they used electric circular saws. I knew these things were loud, but at that time of night, the sound was horrendous! No-one in the vicinity had much sleep that night! Several complaints followed in the following week regarding that exercise. After half an hour of peace shattering noise, they were satisfied they had enough material to complete their construction, and they set to again with a vengeance. By 2.30am the gantry was complete, and they could leave, having re-stocked the cigarettes themselves, and a photograph taken to prove completion of the work.
Having at last regained access to the area, we began restocking. We had been given a new stock plan and we prepared the stock to fill the areas prior to opening the next morning. To our dismay, the shelves were not of the same capacity, and this left a further problem of storing excess stock. Sorting through bottles of wine and spirits precariously balanced in trolleys was a recipe for disaster, and the inevitable happened. The first indication was a drip from one of the trolleys. The first investigation revealed nothing, but there was much clinking of glass. It was only when reaching the bottom of the pile that the offender was found. Why did it have to be the most expensive? Exit one bottle of American liquor. There was no chance of a scramble for straws, which I had joked about previously, due to the way it had broken. The liquid was full of glass shards - shame - and what a waste. But that was the only casualty of the exercise.
By 4am, my fellow worker/sufferer, had decided that sufficient stock had been shifted back into place, and, as she had small children, she would have to get some sleep before the little monsters were awake, and would have to go. She promised to return the following evening to complete anything which I had not managed to do. The store is quite eerie when you are on your own, but the work progressed quickly, due to lack of distractions. I lost track of time, and was surprised by the morning shift arriving. They were equally surprised that I was still on the premises, but pleased by the new appearance of the front of the store. An offer of continuing the re-stocking by fresher staff was accepted by a very exhausted manager, and I made my weary way home at 9.30am. It had been far worse than I imagined, but it was all over now, wasn't it? Famous last words.
After the whole day asleep, I felt refreshed enough to return to tackle the software tutorial, prior to the system being installed. The demonstration went well, it looked simple enough and upon return the staff were given the manual to study in preparation for the following day.
The software was installed onto the computer and tills. This took most of the day, causing further mayhem due to the incompatibility of the two systems. The following day, though, bought no further chaos. The system ran nicely and calm returned once more. As disasters come in threes, I was not so complacent. The next day, chaos returned.
I was preparing paperwork prior to a budget meeting with the Area Manager, when a member of staff reported that the main till was acting strangely. On investigation, it appeared that it had closed down the program and returned to the icon screen. A simple restart, and all appeared fine. We had been warned - don't panic, there's bound to be a glitch or two until you get used to the new system. This started a round of "I-told-you-so" amongst the less computer friendly members of staff. I reassured them and warned them to be careful regarding the buttons they pressed - just in case, and returned to the office. This happened again a while later, so an investigation was required. A shut-down and restart of the system revealed a larger problem. Scandisk reported "6,543 virus and 1,111,098 data, which may, or may not, be important. Do you wish to remove this file?" Perhaps not, I thought, tabbing through to (I)gnore. It booted up fine, but, as I left the cashier, I was puzzled. Virus? How? This is a "closed" system, with no ability to add any data!
There were several repeats of this throughout the day, including one after I had gone home, which lead to a telephone call to the main IT Help Desk as the system started to report a Systems Error as well. It seemed impossible to restart and caused a major problem. As credit cards are used, they are checked by a clearance house via telephone line and the main till holds the modem, which other tills access. With the system not running, the modem was inaccessible, excluding credit card transactions. As much of the evening trade uses credit card transactions, we would lose a lot of trade. An engineer was requested to appear the follow day to rectify the problem, as the Help Desk could not assist. This problem had never been reported before.
The engineer arrived the following day, interrupting the budget meeting between the Area Manager and myself, which had been expected. By this time, the till computer had automatically booted into SafeMode despite intervention. The engineer seemed confident he could sort this with no difficulty, so we left him to his task, and resumed the meeting. As Area Managers generally are only concerned about the smooth running of the shop and meeting budget targets, the computer problem was not his concern - yet.A short while later, the meeting was interrupted by the engineer, who seemed perplexed. He informed us that he could not get out of SafeMode and no icons appeared to be on the system, leaving him to conclude either the drive was dead or the contents had been erased. He appeared more puzzled than panicky, but he had an idea. His Grand Plan was to "ghost" one drive to the other as he had not been supplied with a copy of the new software - but - as this meant both tills being out of action, we would have to close the shop. I agreed, but a coughing fit from behind reminded me that the Area Manager was still present. Close the shop!! Shutting the shop meant losing trade - which is sacrilege in his eyes. The engineer then went into great detail concerning the problem and his options, the simplest of which was his proposal. As the AM's eyes glazed over, it became obvious he did not understand a single word. The engineer was fluent in a different language, one that AM had no knowledge of. The engineer was also aware that the staff were content to employ themselves gainfully placing the latest delivery onto the shop floor without interruption from customers. I also knew this of my staff, and as the delivery was large, they would not be idle. The engineer promised the task would take no longer than 20 minutes, so eventually it was agreed.
After 20 minutes however, a worried engineer returned. His proposal had not worked, and Plan B had to be invoked. This entailed removal of both drives and swopping them over, still leaving us with no modem, as the second till had no driver for it. By now AM was beginning to despair, and, totally confused, granted him as much time as he wished providing the shop could re-open sometime that day! Budget meeting over, AM refused to leave until we were operational again, restricting the office access severely. It took a further hour before we could re-open the doors, and both the engineer and AM could leave, and calm returned. The new driver software was sent by the IT department through the network an hour later, which I was able to install easily, giving us credit card access again. The new software was re-installed the following day, allowing full access to the whole system again. Panic over again?
Someone somewhere has a strange sense of humour. That evening on returning home, and switching on my computer to collect my e-mails, I have my own problem! Can this be co-incidence? My modem does not work! It was fine in the morning before work, and no-one's been using it. Enter the Other Half (my personal hardware engineer)who investigated further. He gets the modem to work, but we end up with an invalidated partition, which does not clear itself. I manage to retrieve the data, and copy it to another partition. Format the failed partition, and transfer data - it's quicker that way. Well - it should have been.
These computers are ganging up on me. Our next surprise is another failed partition, the one we've just used to store rescued data to. We start all over again. All partitions restored - many hours later, and a well earned rest for us both. Don't you just love computers?
It didn't end there though. Oh no. Problems come in threes here as well. The following morning, the usual routine of collecting e-mails, sorting and reading before work, whilst imbibing in a cup of coffee, is destroyed by the server refusing to connect. Happy bunnies, we are not. We have a few important e-mails to send with no chance. That problem took a week to sort out!
If anything new is suggested again, I'll have to think twice before agreement - seriously! It's not the new items which prove the problems, it's the areas which they effect. I've got a problem with the CD Rom drive at home, will it read properly? Will it heck! Get a new one? I'd rather try fixing it first, even though it might not be a bad idea to get a new one, anyway. I'll have to leave that to the Other Half - he of greater technical ability with things electrical than I.
All is peaceful again at work, the days glide smoothly along. Apart from losing one assistant - you remember the one that tries to sell disposable barbecues for indoor use? We are given three hours notice of her departure - on a Bank Holiday Monday! Ever tried finding someone to cover a 7-hour shift on a Bank Holiday at short notice? Hen's dental surgeons are more plentiful! Very many thanks to the staff which covered, giving up their plans for the day.
That's all for now, but stay tuned. The annual manager's conference is looming, and, if previous conferences are anything to go by, there should be plenty to make you smile. For example : I almost ran someone over last year in a buggy. That's not the way to make your way up the corporate ladder, by killing off the opposition! Let's see if I can't better that, this time. Happy shopping.
