An "urgent" memo Walmart sent to all store managers urges them to make much needed changes with "Chilled and Fresh" items to boost declining sales, The New York Times reported.
Managers were instructed to markdown meat and baked goods that were close to expiring so they could be sold before the deadlines. They were also asked to throw out old dairy products like milk and eggs and restock them in the display cases, according to the memo leaked by a disgruntled manager and obtained by The NY Times.
But in the same breath, the memo asks managers not to exceed weekly labor hours Walmart assigned to each branch. In other words, the nation's largest retailer wants staff to keep tabs of the merchandise, get rid of aging meat and make sure shelves are always stocked, but hours have reportedly been cut to the point where there aren't enough employees to do the work.
"Understaffing from the sales floor to the front end has greatly affected the store," Janet Sparks, a customer service manager at a Louisiana Walmart, told the newspaper.
The retailer began cutting staff in 2010, Sparks said. Another assistant store manager in the South, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said in recent years he has been forced to throw out more eggs, milk and produce because Walmart wont let him add staff hours.
According to an October report from the market analysis company Wolf Research, if Walmart's "employees' growth had kept up with square footage growth in the U.S. over a number of years," the company would have 200,000 more employees, The NY Times reported.
Even retail analysts agree there is too much labor and too few workers around to do it.
"Labor hours have been cut so thin, that they don't have the people to do many activities," retail consultant Burt P. Flickinger III told the newspaper. "The fact that they don't do some of these things every day, every shift, shows what a complete breakdown Walmart has in staffing and training."
The breakdown has not gone unnoticed by the company, which over the last 18 months has seen slow sales at stores that have been open at least a year.
In August, a month before the memo was sent, Walmart U.S. Chief Executive Greg Foran said they are adding hours for employees in sections like the bakery, deli and overnight stocking, The NY Times noted.
A Walmart spokeswoman confirmed the memo was sent and said they are working to address the problems, such as offering money back to customers who are not satisfied with their un-fresh groceries.
"We certainly have been focused on fresh for quite some time now and our C.E.O. has been vocal about our need to improve in this category," spokeswoman Deisha Barnett told the newspaper. "We've made a lot of progress, but we are always working to do better."
