Sunday, September 19, 2004
Starsucks
Well, I just got back from our ASSimilation meeting with the Shiny New Manager. The Shiny New Manager is, indeed, very shiny. She seems like a really great person -- she's young, amiable, funny and apparently has a fairly laid-back managerial approach -- none of this micromanaging business. We anticipate that she and the Assistant Manager of Doom will butt heads quite a lot. I know whose side I'll be on, heh heh heh. I'll get to work a closing shift with her this week, so we'll see how that goes. I'm actually looking forward to it.
Speaking of the Assistant Manager of Doom (henceforth the AMOD), she's been a real pain lately. Apparently she walked out of the store on Friday morning about 4 hours before she was scheduled to leave, all because of a minor disagreement about pastry refridgeration. Also, I understand that she was a greedy pig and took almost all of the marked-out stuff yesterday -- those mark-outs are for all of us, not just her. She took everything she liked, and left the more undesireable items for everyone else. She also, from what I understand, literally yanked a jar of mocha powder out of another partner's hands and told her to get back up to the front of the store and work, since the markouts were for the people who had been there all morning. PLEASE.
In other words, the AMOD is not just a sucktastic manager, she's also greedy and immature.
Last night I flipped all the lids upside-down -- she has a "problem" with the lids being stacked in that position, because it's apparently not up to "standard". And these minor rules, that DO NOT matter so much in the grand scheme of things, are her personal bugbears. I flipped the lids over purely to annoy her. It was wrong, I know, but I couldn't resist.
It's one thing if she's going to be a standards Nazi. But if she's going to be that way, then she needs to make sure she's upholding all the standards -- especially the big ones, such as not talking on her cell phone while she's behind the bar and customers need to be served, and giving people breaks and lunches, and leaving the store clean for the next shift, and serving customers before doing other duties, etc. etc.
In other Starbucks news, last night sucked in so many ways. First, I came in to discover that there would only be three of us working from 4PM to closing. Now, the Austin City Limits music festival is going on this weekend, and we're one of the closest Starbucks -- so we were unusually busy for a Saturday night. On top of that, when I came in, the store looked like crap because the AMOD doesn't do her job.
I also had a splitting headache. The perfect way to start the night.
So, we had to finish some of the morning tasks and then get started on our regular closing duties. We're fairly busy. Lots of frappuccinos. We quickly fall a little behind in our close.
Then, around seven o'clock, a young guy comes in and orders a cappuccino. He didn't have enough money to pay for it, so he ordered a black coffee instead. I charged him for the drink and turned my back to get it.
As my back was turned, HE STOLE OUR TIP JAR.
I saw him sprinting out the door and wondered where he was going so fast. Then, as he ran past the windows, I saw that he had our plexiglass tip jar in his hands.
Cameron gave chase, but the guy was fast and disappeared before anyone could catch up. I got to call the police and give a description and a report and all that fun stuff. I also got to fill out an internal incident report regarding the situation -- though I had to go to one of the neighbouring stores to get said report form, because we were all out (big surprise). Needless to say, all the drama definitely slowed our close even further. The rest of the night was just one big frustration.
Also, we had to deal with Mr. Creepy, a homeless guy who has literally been living at the store for the past few days. He comes in, will sometimes get a water, and then sits in the chairs and sleeps or doodles on a notepad. We're not sure what to do about him. He creeps me right out, because he's always staring at me when I go to clean the cafe area, or when he walks past the bar to the bathroom. He also hangs out around the register and impulse-display areas, but will scamper off anytime someone comes near -- I think he might be trying to steal tips or the food items on the counter. I hate having to deal with stuff like that.
Thus endeth the rant. For now. More updates as we settle in with the new manager, and hopefully see the AMOD put in her place.
| 2:21 PM |
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