Starbucks Baristas: The daily grind
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Closing crew isn’t the reason for everything going wrong in your store! (self.starbucksbaristas)
submitted by Deadrax502
That is my Ted talk thank you.
[deleted] 258 points 8m ago
Let’s put the opener/closer argument to bed. It’s actually the manager’s fault for not scheduling enough coverage leading up to the close.
crypt0Stega73 103 points 8m ago
I'd agree if the managers got unlimited hours to schedule. More like corporate expecting green beans & new shifts to work like multi-year partners. 🙃
[deleted] 10 points 8m ago
Also correct
nicolelynnejones 35 points 8m ago
A great pre closer can make or break your shift. Or at the bare minimum, decent bar and reg coverage so the manager can do a good pre close. The afternoon decides what kind of close it’s going to be
[deleted] 21 points 8m ago
Imma let you finish but first run three lunches, do two inventory counts, a pull, closing cleaning tasks, and make cold brew 😎
nicolelynnejones 6 points 8m ago
Acting like I don’t close every single night lol
[deleted] 1 points 8m ago
I feel the pain believe me
funktionones 1 points 8m ago
talk to your manager about having cold brew done in the morning if possible
MasterMischievous 9 points 8m ago
I wish it were that simple, but I open and I close all the time. And the issue isn’t whos fault or whose really. What’s ruining the store is the whining and complaining, which I’d say 100% comes from the openers. When I close I never hear a peep out of my crew about what a mess the morning crew leaves. They put their heads down and do the best they can to clean up. The morning crew however bitches about doing their regardless, but man if they have to do something “the evening crew should have taken care of” it’s complaint after complaint. And man do they care what sort of a shitshow is left for the evening? Hell no they don’t.
Deadrax502 [OP] 2 points 8m ago
I agree entirely
mycheesecakes 1 points 8m ago
for real!!! as someone who almost always closes sometimes things don’t get finished simply because there’s not enough time. Most nights there’s 3 regular baristas and 1 shift. The shift is doing the pull and one of the baristas is on their break meaning there’s 2 baristas to cover drive through, bars, and front reg/warning so cs gets forgotten about until we’re finally closed so who ever is closing cs is always scrambling to get things done smh.
darkwolf523 1 points 8m ago
Facts
Danny_z64 105 points 8m ago
I think all the supervisors at my store have done multiple closings before, so no one blames closing on anything unless it's like really obvious. We all understand that things trickle down so we try to get stuff done on time so it doesn't all fall to closing
kitcat1210 85 points 8m ago
god i WISH, even the openers that spent years closing still blamed us for literally no reason like they just hated us LOL, finally my manager came IN to see us close a few times and then would come in and do some opens and see that nothing was wrong and we were leaving incredible closes and told them basically to stfu and leave us alone and they did. then they all started fighting w each other and we all just realized the morning crew at my store thrives on drama for some reason so they literally start makin up issues so they have something to complain about😭
voldys_moldy_witch 18 points 8m ago
I honestly thought you were talking about my store, this is our situation right now, SO MUCH DRAMA
dnims24 6 points 8m ago
Eww that sounds so toxic and I’m so sorry you have to deal with them
kaynist 3 points 8m ago
no bc what is the deal w openers all being like this???? i guess open just attracts a certain kind of person 💀
kirbinkipling 31 points 8m ago
This is so true. I feel like more stores should have shifts rotate every once in a while to ensure everyone knows how things for open/mid/close. I’ve noticed significant differences between stores who have shifts rotate every now and then for training purposes versus stores where shifts stay planted in one time slot.
Vegan_Sweetie 8 points 8m ago
I kind’a agree about that. I mean, obviously it doesn’t work that way because of availability, but it would be great.
kirbinkipling 6 points 8m ago
Agreed! Definitely think peoples availability can cause limitations on the concept of cross training shifts on different time slots. In that case I think what the person above said about the manager witnessing both open/close to see if there was anything that required fixing could be an amazing option instead. That being said in my personal opinion (that I know most won’t agree with) I feel if you are shift with that responsibility you should be able to maybe once a fiscal quarter be flexible to do a shift you don’t normally do for training purposes. Primary reason I’m saying that is because cross training is proven to be better just like how baristas shouldn’t only bar or drive thru every shift. Also in cases of emergency if no one else is available and an opening shift has to close, like a legitimate store need, it would be beneficial for that shift to be familiar with closing. Again literally just my opinion and know it prolly won’t be popular.
Vegan_Sweetie 2 points 8m ago
I totally agree about shifts doing different shifts periodically, and also SM’s should investigate personally as needed to settle disputes. 100% agree.
andersonm499 2 points 8m ago
Same we have a pretty good system so we all help each other out
sailorgrumpycat 75 points 8m ago
In my experience, day crew does what they can until they are scheduled to leave, and then **immediately** leaves. Anything they can't get to gets backlogged to night crew, and if we don't get to it *then* its an issue, so night crew ends up being the ones who stay late, so that night crew doesn't end up getting harangued about missed tasks.
BelligerentCoroner 17 points 8m ago
Your night crew are allowed to stay late? We can't go over on labor. It gets done it or it doesn't, but we leave on time. Especially for closers.
sailorgrumpycat 12 points 8m ago
Only to a certain extent, one that I try to never push the boundaries of. Sometimes we leave an extra 20 -30 minutes late, but never more than that. It isn't very often (maybe 1/2 times per month), usually we break our backs getting shit done and leave on time or maybe 5-10 minutes late.
looker009 8 points 8m ago
It depends on a store. I worked at few that closed lobby 30 min before drive thru and as long it wasn't crazy we could leave with in 5-10 min. Those that had both lobby and drive thru closed at the same time, that was more difficult. We basically had to do closing task of lobby cleaning around customers and if it was full that was kind of was hard as we would had to clean under every single customer.
lewabwee 1 points 8m ago
It depends on the store in my experience. I sometimes tell the baristas we can’t stay late just so they actually care about getting out on time.
existentialpenguin95 9 points 8m ago
As someone who has both opened and closed, I have rarely been permitted to leave from an opening shift right when it ended, more likely than not being given another task that takes 10-15 minutes, unless I was nearing a meal violation. That being said, I really think that the whole argument should be put to rest since this job is basically terrible for everyone across the board. A little empathy goes a long way, especially when we’re all aware how one thing going wrong can throw the whole shift into a tailspin.
badatlife15 9 points 8m ago
This 👏 my goodness, I know people complain about bad opens, but I see so many of these posts of closers complaining about being blamed for being the problem, the whole thing comes down to its a system set up to not work right. Show me a store that gets adequate coverage across ALL dayparts and then we might have a store that doesn’t have this “openers vs closers” problem. There are different challenges across all shifts, in an ideal world everyone would rotate at least occasionally to see that the grass isn’t always greener. Everyone would be required to work an awful shift as an opener and as a closer (let’s not forget mids), but as people old enough to be working at Starbucks, we should all realize it’s not an ideal world. Start fighting for better coverage/evenly split store responsibilities and less pointing fingers at the other baristas.
Late_Pomelo_999 15 points 8m ago
As someone who works open and close frequently (often closing one night then opening the next) it’s easy to write things off as the closing doing something wrong but honesty sometimes it’s just Starbucks machinery being Starbucks, or the night time was unusually busy. Going in 8 hours later and seeing things I’ve clearly cleaned at night just looking nasty in the morning is odd to me. I hate the whole closing vs. opening thing because there’s challenges to both and while I think it’s definitely harder on the floor in the morning, there’s challenges to the cleaning part which are just nasty too.
thechamelioncircuit 12 points 8m ago
Most of the time it’s openers doing literally nothing
darkwolf523 1 points 8m ago
Fr though
thechamelioncircuit 3 points 8m ago
Like we just keep getting piled with more and more when they literally only have to deal with peak. Like I’m sorry, that sucks, but we have to deal with literally everything else.
darkwolf523 2 points 8m ago
Yup
deltaWhiskey91L 11 points 8m ago
I regularly worked opening, mid, and closing but preferred closing as a barista. The morning crew blamed everything on closing because we were tired and up well before we wanted to be; we could easily do tasks leftover from closing with all of the dead time in the morning. If we didn't get all of our work done, well whatever. Mid was always lazy and didn't give a shit if they had to pick up left over morning tasks and didn't care to do pre-closing tasks. Closing has to do everything perfectly or else we were hated by everyone even if we were short staffed and busy until closing time.
It's mostly a meme that everything is closing's fault. Though the real issue is that corporate intentionally short staffs hours and everyone willingly puts extra tasks onto closing yet gets pissed at closing for not finishing everything.
It's mostly a meme that everything is closing's fault. Though the real issue is that corporate intentionally short staffs hours and everyone willingly puts extra tasks onto closing yet gets pissed at closing for not finishing everything.
milky_peach 3 points 8m ago
Couldn't have said it better myself 😩
cats_with_tentacles 11 points 8m ago
As an opener, my only beef with closers is that they constantly lose the display case tags 😭 idk how, idk why, but they lose like 5 a week.
GhostfaceJK 11 points 8m ago
i try my best to get everything done but it’s hard when ur still two months new and there never seems to be enough ppl 😭
looker009 10 points 8m ago
Staffing usually was the issue on why we couldn't do everything we needed during closing but even if we did everything perfect opening would always find something to complain about . I really wish everyone would work as a team. If we had late rush and couldn't get to mopping lobby , opening crew can find 10-15 to do it.
extrashotextrahot 8 points 8m ago
All of our closers are minors who won't work and call out 🥲
darkwolf523 4 points 8m ago
To be fair, it’s the law for minors to not work late.
extrashotextrahot 13 points 8m ago
Then to be fair, they shouldn't be given those hours. Again probably comes down to a managerial or scheduling problem
darkwolf523 1 points 8m ago
Yup
Torirock10 7 points 8m ago
it’s actually midshift >:)
Deadrax502 [OP] 1 points 8m ago
Devil’s advocate
W0lf_2020 7 points 8m ago
The only reason my store has this argument is because 1/2 of the floor is in the back talking or on their phones during afternoon shifts. They never get in trouble for it and morning crew would literally be chewed out if we even glance at our phones or stay in the back too long. It’s been an issue for a while at my store
Imaginarybluntallday 1 points 8m ago
This. Anyone who is a closer is almost always late onto the floor in my store. It’s a work ethic thing; and I’m not mad at the closers for it. They do what we get paid to do still, except they late a lot. It’s management only making a certain part of the day important, along with only being in my store before 3pm basically. There is no person to enforce for them. It sucks as an shift that does open, mid, and close to see the difference and hear it all but never be able to go to my manager for support to help change the store to be more fluid… she just cares about the “actuals”
cheshthekiid 6 points 8m ago
I used to be on closing crew and then I switched to opening. Nothing made me angrier than when morning would blame closers. Like stfu
ElevatorsAreScary 5 points 8m ago
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: supervisors should need to be available for all day parts at least once a week, and should be scheduled to work different shifts. All my stores issues come from the fact that all our morning supervisors only work 5:30-12 Monday-Friday. And the remaining three of us do everything else
friendlySkeletor 4 points 8m ago
No but the fact that closing is regularly understaffed is. We have an hour for two people to get everything done and everyone is surprised when we only get it done on slow nights.
ThisGuyTokes420 4 points 8m ago
Except someone on my closing crew put pineapple refresher in a brand new jug instead of an already stained one. That should be illegal.
geekgurl81 6 points 8m ago
Let’s be honest, the pineapple refresher should be illegal.
Shoddy-Trainer-8051 3 points 8m ago
Tbh I still do blame the closers when there are no backups, no lids, milks missing in the fridges and things are dirty. I’ve closed plenty and always managed to do at least half those things but I’m rarely extended the same courtesy so I stopped closing
skyljneto 3 points 8m ago
thank you omg 😭 at my store there’s like a separation from closing and opening supervisors, one opener also closes ONE night a week and there’s always slick comments in our book… i feel like as a part of our closing crew, my job is to set them up for the morning and their job is just make it through peak and not worry about the close or the mess they made 😭
floofxs2 3 points 8m ago
I loved opening so I mostly did opens, disliked closing. But I don’t ever remember thinking the closers sucked or really heard any of the openers (at either of the stores I worked at) consistently point to closers screwing things up - every once in a while I’d hear SSV say like wth it’s a mess in here?! But sometimes it was - that’s about it. If certain things weren’t done it was usually more along the lines of “damn it must’ve been super busy yesterday”.
g_pvp_3 2 points 8m ago
it’s mostly the open/mid ppl , us closers do everything
JunipherStar 1 points 8m ago
Yes usually that’s the case, but not at my store. I have to do closing and opening tasks when I open because the closers we’ve had in the past year don’t do anything at night 😭 Also mid shift doesn’t set them up well, it’s so frustrating as someone who used to close and now opens to see the laziness.
[deleted] 1 points 8m ago
[removed]
Necessary_Low939 1 points 8m ago
Yaaaass
graylikesoap 1 points 8m ago
retweet oh my fucking god
vanilllacakez 1 points 8m ago
Nah Im just kidding lol
vanilllacakez -2 points 8m ago
Yes they are.
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