Greetings Korner Variety part-time and full-time employees and welcome to the 31st issue of the Korner Variety Monthly Newsletter. As always, this edition comes to you hot off our self-serve photocopier by the freezer and folded into your pay check envelope with a Scratch ‘N’ Score ticket. And now, the news!
Our current magazine rack sign is in desperate need of repair. The current “Buy don’t read the magazines. Not the library!” sign has grown sun-soaked to the point where the black lettering has faded into an embarrassing dull brown. Also, the corners are dog-eared, the Scotch tape holding the sign to the TV Guide rack is slipping, and someone has written “you’re magazines suck!!!” on the sign in red pen. For our new sign I was thinking that we could go with “Do you see shelves of books and librarians here? No? That’s because this isn’t a library so please purchase your magazine before reading it!” I thought this new “added-detail” message might hit home with more people. Andrew, please make this sign on your new computer before you head off to college. I’ve left a CD of clipart labeled “Paul’s Personal Pics” for you under the counter and I recommend using the one of that duck in a business suit swinging the ball peen hammer at his computer. Please have the proofs ready for my approval by close of business Sunday.
As of August 1, we will no longer be letting customers cut the tops off their own Freezies. This new measure seeks to prevent getting little pieces of plastic as well as drops of sticky Freezie juice all over our counter. However, we will continue our offer to cut Freezies for customers. All other Freezie procedures remain the same, and I’ve included the relevant section from the Korner Variety constitution again below for anyone who forgets:
By-Law 4: Customer Protocol
Part III: Freezie Procedures
i) When cutting Freezie tops make sure to cut across the entire Freezie (no corner-cuts or half-cuts).
ii) Rotate the Freezie stock every Monday and Thursday. Keep the white and yellow Freezies near the top because they rotate slower.
iii) If people ask you what flavor a certain color of Freezie is, remember that red is cherry, purple is grape, orange is orange, yellow is banana, and blue and white are mysteriously unknown.
iv) If a customer asks if they can cut their own Freezie, say no. (NEW!)
In accordance with our seasonal candy lineup changes, we are discontinuing:
* Jumping Gummies (brown)
* Frog Juice Liquid
* Too Sour Tummy Powder
We are introducing:
* Jumping Gummies (mauve)
* L’il Squishy Porcupines
* Elastic Balls: The Gum That Bounces
Jamie, can you return the remainder of our discontinued product to Sugary Distributing using a C-8 returns form? (The forms are located beside the Lite cigarettes.) Please write “Really STALE!” in the Reason section. I will modify our Point of Sale database to reflect these changes. For your information, the latest Sugary Distributing reports show that L’il Squishy Porcupines and Elastic Balls are now up to a 4.0% and 5.2% share of the candy market respectively. Looks like our candy section sales may increase this quarter.
Because of the growing amount of silvery Scratch ‘N’ Score ticket coating scraps left on our counter, I have installed a new 4.8 volt Black & Decker Wet/Dry DustBuster below the video rental tags. I have added the following new section to the Korner Variety constitution regarding DustBuster protocol:
By-Law 7: Cleaning
Part VII: DustBuster Procedure
i) Leave the DustBuster below the counter unless it is in use.
ii) Do not bust dust when customers are in the store.
Thank you to this week’s letter writer. As always, please remember to send letters to letters@kornervarietyopen24hours.com.
Dear Paul Shemp,
You’re the manager of a variety store. You’re not the CEO of a big company. Do you understand? Stop saying that Korner Variety is a “horizontally-integrated firm” with “global expansion opportunities and a mission-critical path to success.” All your employees think you’re a loser. Do you do anything besides think about Korner Variety? Why do you even write a whole newsletter about everything? Get a life, Paul. Oh yeah, and watch out because I switched the Oh Henrys with the Junior Mints! Uh-oh! It’s CHAOS!
Anonymous
You joker! Everyone knows that we discontinued Junior Mints in May due to the growing consumer trend away from the entire mint-chocolate segment. Thank you for your feedback! Keep on writing!
Paul
Korner Variety mainstay and store veteran Andrew “Iron Horse” Windigan is the employee of the month! Congratulations, Andrew! Korner Variety thanks you for your 3.8 months of service and wishes you the best as you leave our little “communist dump,” as you jokingly call it! For his services, Andrew wins two popsicles, a bag of chips, and yesterday’s newspaper. Andrew, please have your locker cleaned out by Sunday. I’ll have your deposit back when I perform the inspection on Monday morning.
With the installation of the new pay phone outside of Pizza-Savvy next door we have started getting an increased request to provide quarters to people. To capitalize on this increased traffic I have outfitted our counter with a selection of 25 cent candy. Neilson chocolate chunks, large-sized sour keys, and Grapefruit Explosions have all been placed next to the spiced meat stick section. Please try and upsell something using the techniques outlined in By-Law 9 of the constitution before giving out change.
We are continuing with our fourth test month with a new type of straws. The research results thus far (with the reason for discontinuation in brackets) are summarized below:
March – Straws wrapped in paper. (Too much littering outside store.)
April – Flexible straws. (Too short for tall drinks.)
May – Thin straws. (Bad for Slushees.)
This month we are going with spoon straws. I have provided Straw Feedback Forms under the cash tray and ask only that you have customers fill them out with pencil or dark pen. As always, I will tabulate the data and perform our regular set of analyses before making a final decision. Our quest for the perfect straw soldiers on, friends. Let us move forward together.
We close this month by reminding all employees that they may submit content for the Korner Variety Monthly Newsletter at any time. I know all Korner Variety employees have been busy so I’ve set a Korner Variety FTP site to make submissions easier and anonymous. The address is:
ftp://kornervarietyopen24hours.com and the password is: “takeapennyleaveapenny”
Don’t forget that we have our monthly security review session later tonight at my house, and Richard Watson from the Dairy Board will be coming in an hour before we open on Saturday to tell us all about their new packaging changes and how this will affect our fridge shelving.
Thanks for reading, everyone!
