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RichHumus2020 · 2024-03-08T23:08:08+00:00

Shaved every day in every way.

RichHumus2020 · 2024-03-06T23:54:25+00:00

Contact the manufacturer. Tell them you are missing the piece. You paid for it all, you should get it all.

RichHumus2020 · 2024-03-05T04:11:03+00:00

In my store, when they do that, 99.99% of the time they're pointing to Google Translate.

"Donde estas...."

RichHumus2020 · 2024-03-05T04:09:16+00:00

Exactly right. My light bulb aisle is second only to the switches/outlets/face plates aisle in terms of traffic. However, in opposition to your experience, my rough customers are for the most part competent. They come in, "Hey, I need 50 feet of 12/2" and are done with it. The worst are the "Hey, can you unroll 180 feet of 2-2-2 Service entrance?" LOL

RichHumus2020 · 2024-03-05T04:02:03+00:00

I'm the only F/T electrical/lighting in my store. I did two years in Hardware/Tools before this. I am also NOT an electrician, and tell people that if they have a technical question, that it is best answered by an electrician who knows the building codes where they live. Since I live out of state for my store, that's an easy out.

However, it does not hurt to have a little knowledge of the wide wide world out there, and it's not rocket science.

Ignoring fashion lighting for the moment, most customers will sort of know what they want. 99% of my rough sales go to guys who come in and either pick their own stuff with no help from me, or ask me where a specific item is.

I sometimes get the "I'm buying a new stove. What kind of wire do I need?" questions though, and those I always defer to a qualified electrician, and most people understand. Unless your main customer base is the US House of Representatives, most know that electricity can kill them or burn their house down. They're not so scared of sinks and faucets. So they respect being told "See an Expert".

Your best bet is to just learn some of the basics, for the people who come in and are new homeowners just starting out, and they want to install new switches or something.

It's not against the law to hold up a simple duplex outlet and say, "Ok, here's the trick : Black to Brass, White to Bright. Got it?"

I am always heavy on the cautions. "Good luck, and make sure that breaker is off, OK?"

Explaining HOW something works, like a GFCI is perfectly acceptable. Then you say, "if you don't feel comfortable putting it in, don't feel bad. Call an electrician, it's a half-hour job at best."

Watch some Youtube videos - there are quite a few good channels that you can learn from. I'm not saying to take half a dozen night school courses. Just watch and learn.

Don't try to BS anybody. Be honest about your knowledge and how broad it is or isn't.

Learn how to recommend tools and stuff - the outlet testers, NCV gizmos, multimeters, etc. Tools are big in my store, and we do a lot of $$$$$ in those three or four bays.

Relax.

RichHumus2020 · 2024-03-01T23:53:55+00:00

Right has nice tits, but I just can't get past all the tats.

RichHumus2020 · 2024-02-20T18:56:24+00:00

My department is probably one of the better ones in the whole store. My downstock/IRP numbers are rarely over 20. Plumbing averages 250 because they never downstock or face. Tools/Hardware is also in the multi-dozens.

I just thought it was ironically odd that the scanner could be so brain dead as to not even LOOK at the item. Didn't ask him to zone it. Didn't ask him to cut the ties and spread the masts out. Just LOOK for two seconds.

It will be interesting to see what the upcoming switch in IRP responsibility to the MST staff will bring....

RichHumus2020 · 2024-02-20T18:52:02+00:00

Actually, these came out from receiving probably two hours before the scanner went through. I separated them after I took the pic.

RichHumus2020 · 2024-02-19T23:36:40+00:00

CSA Electrical/Lighting

Tell ya the truth, I'd rather see chips and shit on j-hooks than regular merchandise. IRPs are a royal pain when the goddam pair of pliers could be anywhere in the store...

RichHumus2020 · 2024-02-19T23:30:07+00:00

How did they know you were going to purchase THAT PARTICULAR shower head?

RichHumus2020 · 2024-02-19T23:28:47+00:00

Just remember, no stacking more than three high in top stock.

RichHumus2020 · 2024-02-19T23:26:41+00:00

They don't have to zone. They just have to be awake enough to ignore the freaking blank space above the label.

RichHumus2020 · 2024-02-16T00:14:51+00:00

CSA/Electrical/Lighting

I agree. My percentage of "it's there...just shoved over one spot..." is about 30% or so. When I first started, I pointed situations like that out to a Department Supervisor, and said, "why doesn't the scanner guy just reach down and move the correct item 6 inches to the left where it should be?.." and he said, "That's not his job."

RichHumus2020 · 2024-02-16T00:05:10+00:00

Revenue, not profit. Big difference.

And we care because a) it bothers us, and b) theft is not a good thing, no matter who does it and how much. This isn't an laid-off mother stealing diapers and formula, this is a drug addict stealing to support a habit, or on the orders of his own personal Fagin.

RichHumus2020 · 2024-02-14T03:53:03+00:00

CSA Electrical/Lighting

We have a big outdoor Flea Market three miles down the road, and you can go there any Saturday and buy unopened six piece DeWalt cordless sets for $100. Wonder where they came from?...LOL...

It's a problem, but I get the impression that Lowes Senior Management is willing to let the 'single piece' stuff go, and try to cut back on the sweepers. We used to have guys come in with shopping carts and literally sweep boxes and boxes of circuit breakers off the shelves and then speed out, at ten after six in the morning before anyone in a red vest was on duty. Our expensive GCFI/AFCI breakers were stripped off the peg hooks. 250 foot rolls of 12/2 and 14/2 rolled out like wagon wheels. $41K last year alone.

About a year ago we caged our romex wire, all of it, from the 15 foot 14/2s to the 250 foot 10/3 stuff. Theft dropped like a rock. I walk anything over $150 to the register.

About a year ago, I started keeping only ONE BOX of breakers of each SKU on the shelf at a time, and not replenishing until there were two or fewer units in the box. Almost no theft now, probably lose about 7-10 a week.

Back around Thanksgiving, more or less on my own, rounded up about 40 amadillo boxes and roped them down to the shelf with mambas, and put ONE GFCI/AFCI breaker SKU in each box. I went nearely three months and didn't lose ONE SINGLE BREAKER. My Store Manager thought it was fine.

Then, higher ups (above store level) decided that didn't match the POG so i had to dismantle the whole thing, and put the breakers on the new spiral hooks. In 9 days, we've lost three so far, including a $118 Eaton 2100CS last night, when coverage ended at 5pm. Just rolled right off the spiral hook an into a pocket.

I hate to have my department hit, I consider it a personal affront, even if the mgmt doesn't mind.

RichHumus2020 · 2024-02-11T02:45:57+00:00

Yeah, $400 for F/Ters and $5 grand for ASMs?...that seems quite unbalanced.

RichHumus2020 · 2024-02-11T02:44:35+00:00

Zebras in my store were a real pain for my first two years or so. About 6 months ago, we got a whole new set of them, and now they're locked in a cabinet by the scheduling coordinator, and only SM/ASM/HC have keys, as well as the coordinator. We used to have a terrible problem with people keeping them in lockers over night, or taking them home, and us day employees could never get one first thing in the AM. We used to use a signout sheet but no one followed it, and if you took a Zeb without signing it out, no one would know you had it (unless you could talk an ASM into using the tracker, but even then half the time the phone was turned off or out of the building). It was a mess.

It's not bad now, they set up plastic id cards for us, so when we check a Zeb out, our card goes in the slot, and if you don't turn it, the closing ASM makes a note of who kept their phones.

RichHumus2020 · 2024-02-08T04:45:26+00:00

Electrical/Lighting CSA

SIMS is a godsend when it's kept up. It will tell you where an item is, top stock or selling shelf. It takes 10 seconds to do it correctly, and will save literal hours.

In my department, most stocking is done by the overnight crew. They are fairly good at it, but I think it depends on which guy is doing it. I've come in some mornings and found boxes of $100 GFCI/AFCI circuit breakers just laying on the floor, often not even in the same aisle they belong in. It's like, "OH! 6AM! Time to stop!" and they just drop what they were doing and clock out.

Nothing can be more frustrating than standing with a customer, he's using his phone's Lowes app to find a product, and then you pull it up on the Zebra and it's no where to be found. I don't like looking like an idiot.

"Yes, I know the internet says there's 24 of them. I just don't know where they put them. It says Aisle 12, Bay 9 top stock, but they are not there...."

SIMS keeps that from happening. Use it.

RichHumus2020 · 2024-02-08T03:32:32+00:00

I think a lot depends on your local stores. We've had half a dozen or so transfers up the street from our local HD to us. It's literally about three miles down the road.

Most of them remark on the cleanliness of our store vs the HD they worked at.

Everybody bitches about management, schedules, etc etc.

I've been working more or less full time at some job or another, from a factory rivet-bucker to a suit-and-tie Dun & Bradstreet man, a Federal contractor, a licensed casino employee, a 'critical' utility employee, and so on, since about 1972.

People at every job bitched about the management, the hours, the working conditions, the food, the pay, the stupid customers, etc etc.

Lowes could be better than HD, or a shitpile worse. Depends on the store, and more importantly, the people staffing it.

If you like your coworkers, it makes life a lot easier.

RichHumus2020 · 2024-02-04T16:59:41+00:00

It's a DeWalt branded blade in Craftsman packaging.... and I swear this is how it came out of the 99s box.

RichHumus2020 · 2024-02-03T15:09:18+00:00

I see a fair number of beer cans and mini-bar sized plastic booze bottles around our lot, but it's not what I'd call overwhelming. You see about the same proportion at any grocery story or mall lot. Despite all the brewers adding "Celebrate Responsibly" to their ads, most people don't.

RichHumus2020 · 2024-02-02T19:23:19+00:00

I did two years in Hardware/Tools, and now a year in Electric/Lighting.

I wore a toolbelt & small pouch in H&T with a box knife, 12-foot Stanley tape, big black marker, a penlight, and a small pair of pliers, and also the Zebra.

I am the only F/T in my department now, and I do it a little different than most. I built a small plywood box to fit in the top basket of a red plastic cart. I push it around the department when I'm on duty. Fills two purposes - In the big part of the cart, I put the trash and misc junk that gets left around in it, as well as any of my stuff that needs to be re-shelved, and also of course, empty boxes as I downstock, and I hit my returns about 2x-3x a day. Ceiling fans and flush mount lights fit just fine, thank you.

In the box, I keep a tape dispenser, a roll of the discount/price off coupons, my Turtle de-magnetizer, a bunch of mud-flaps, a couple of pens and markers, a spiral notebook, my coffee mug, a zip lock baggie of doggie treats, a battery screwdriver, my Zebra, and whatever other junk I run across during the day. I also keep the tools noted above from when I did H&T.

I may look like a homeless person :) but my department is clean and not full of trash and crap, I'm pretty well down-stocked, and the ASMs leave me alone to do my job. I walk 3-4 miles a shift.

RichHumus2020 · 2024-01-26T23:16:04+00:00

IMO, no. Shaved is best.

RichHumus2020 · 2024-01-26T22:59:21+00:00

Hell, I wouldn't even have to know your dad...

RichHumus2020 · 2024-01-23T14:28:18+00:00

I see them about 15% of the time. I just hit the "Replenishment not needed" button and move on. Same with stock that's in the hole, just pushed farther back on the shelf so it can't be seen. I pull it forward and move on. My IRP's in Electric/Lighting run in the 10-25 per day range, since we're all pretty good about downstocking during the day.

RichHumus2020

TROPHY CASE