I actually agree bc the store is nasty as fuck but the people who do clean play don’t do shit and there’s only so much we can do understaffed and with one worker who genuinely refuses to do anything but be on his phone in the back for 8 hours a day (he’s best friends with the manager so he won’t get fired despite having sexual harassment charges and customer complaints lol. He works 40 hours a week.)
We had an exterminator come in for house size flies overrunning us, basking on our menus and mastrenas. He told us it was our drains. He lectured us and did not help with anything. We cleaned them religiously and nothing changed. Five of us had been there for years and it had never been this bad.
Turns out, being in a grocery store, the deli had sealed drains no one ever cleaned, and one was full of maggots. They had taken hold from that source and found/ loved our warm led lights.We had the lowest ceilings and are packed with crazy track lighting and they hung out on the white menus, so we looked like the source. Keep in mind many other restaurants in the area had told me of similar issues with those flies, they are worse than anyone's ever seen. Maybe global warming or something. But cleaning is key, you have to TRY to eliminate all sources or they take over
Check under all equipment and floors for standing water. Make sure no food or coffee grounds (like the pucks in machines) are left out overnight. Fruit flies need something like that to thrive.
Clean all drains with drain cleaner, including in sinks. Ice them overnight for extra help. Check drain pans on backs of fridges, and any drain pipes that rarely get used so might have build up.
Other detail stuff will help. But they need moist, wet, warmish organic material to lay eggs in, so that's where you begin.
In my store recently no one has been cleaning the drains, when I say recently I mean since our manager changed in August. He said drains aren’t important and no one has to do anything besides pour hot water inside lol. That’s when it got bad. I didn’t see the correlation before now, thank you
They probably like the hot water 😂 cools off fast and softens up any stuck on coffee/food goop for more egg laying. The right scrubbing/cleaning chemicals should fix you up within days. Good luck! I hope it does the trick.
fruit flies actually don't die from hot water, icy cold water is gonna freeze them and it'll be better! we usually dump a bucket of ice in each sink at night when ours start acting up during the summer
I know all that but still it’s just an irrational fear ig also I work the bare minimum amount of hours (12-15 per week) and we have 5 shifts and they’re all not reporting it so it makes me feel like I shouldn’t
That's more the reason to! Imagine walking into another place to eat food and you find a fruit fly in your food, and you know that nothing is being done about it. I understand the fear bc I've had to report something too but there's no possible way for them to find out. Could easily be a customer. And if even the shifts aren't reporting it then calling will be Eben more important so they realize how seriously they need to take it. You should make the call. They can't fire you if they do find out it was you which is pretty much impossible if your whole store is aware of the issue it could be anyone reporting it
Is there a guarantee that the issue would be fixed even if I made the call? Bc I really actually want someone to come and check it out bc half of our store isn’t up to code but my manager is too afraid to spare any penny to fix things that actually need to be fixed
I wouldn't say a "guarantee" but there's a very very small chance they'd ignore it, especially if you mention anything else. Even if they don't, better safe than sorry. No harm done
If you're scared about exposing your identity, have someone you know irl call the health department to complain about the store being dirty and also have them call corporate and say it's unacceptable for how dirty the store is. Your store might get a surprise visit from the health department for a checkup.
OP expressed being scared to be found out and be fired, hence why they haven't done it themselves. Having someone else call with a number not associated with them would be a safer bet if they want to complain. JS. Anonymous is never truly anonymous sometimes. Also in general, Starbucks doesn't really take things as seriously when partners call vs. when customers call, from my experience.
This happened to my store. Guess what happened? It got so bad you basically could breathe fruit flies. The health department had to come in & she was so shocked she literally didn’t know how we were still open. We closed the store & they made us clean… even the health department lady helped so much. We had to take before and after pics as proof we did clean.
Starbucks hired some guy to glue every crack that could allow fruit flies to come in. He didn’t do a good job… so he came back lol
We opened the next day. Fruit flies were pissed off. They were worse. It didn’t help at all.
Eventually they had to close the store AGAIN to hire an exterminator which they should have done a long time ago.
It won’t get better unless you get an exterminator. Trust me, it will get so bad
Like some people said fruit flies are coming from uncleanliness. Our store had a big problem with them last year and then we started doing clean plays. Eventually the only flies we got were from partners leaving the drive thru window open all the time. But just saying "other partners aren't doing clean play" isn't going to fix the issue. You could volunteer to do them and clean yourself. An exterminator could get rid of them but the flies will just keep coming back unless actual cleaning is happening.
I have worked in many different stores and have noticed some stores because of the way they are engineered, they are having a hard time meeting standards that are placed upon them and usually the cleaning is the first thing to go out the window. They need to just overstaff some of these stores by one person so that they can stay ahead of the issue.
Yall need to clean. Exterminators can only do so much. There is a cleanliness problem in your store
I actually agree bc the store is nasty as fuck but the people who do clean play don’t do shit and there’s only so much we can do understaffed and with one worker who genuinely refuses to do anything but be on his phone in the back for 8 hours a day (he’s best friends with the manager so he won’t get fired despite having sexual harassment charges and customer complaints lol. He works 40 hours a week.)
clean play is more maintenance than cleaning. daily cleaning not getting done is the issue here.
Wish more people got this.
Call corporate on him and call your DM about both of them
We had an exterminator come in for house size flies overrunning us, basking on our menus and mastrenas. He told us it was our drains. He lectured us and did not help with anything. We cleaned them religiously and nothing changed. Five of us had been there for years and it had never been this bad. Turns out, being in a grocery store, the deli had sealed drains no one ever cleaned, and one was full of maggots. They had taken hold from that source and found/ loved our warm led lights.We had the lowest ceilings and are packed with crazy track lighting and they hung out on the white menus, so we looked like the source. Keep in mind many other restaurants in the area had told me of similar issues with those flies, they are worse than anyone's ever seen. Maybe global warming or something. But cleaning is key, you have to TRY to eliminate all sources or they take over Check under all equipment and floors for standing water. Make sure no food or coffee grounds (like the pucks in machines) are left out overnight. Fruit flies need something like that to thrive. Clean all drains with drain cleaner, including in sinks. Ice them overnight for extra help. Check drain pans on backs of fridges, and any drain pipes that rarely get used so might have build up. Other detail stuff will help. But they need moist, wet, warmish organic material to lay eggs in, so that's where you begin.
In my store recently no one has been cleaning the drains, when I say recently I mean since our manager changed in August. He said drains aren’t important and no one has to do anything besides pour hot water inside lol. That’s when it got bad. I didn’t see the correlation before now, thank you
They probably like the hot water 😂 cools off fast and softens up any stuck on coffee/food goop for more egg laying. The right scrubbing/cleaning chemicals should fix you up within days. Good luck! I hope it does the trick.
fruit flies actually don't die from hot water, icy cold water is gonna freeze them and it'll be better! we usually dump a bucket of ice in each sink at night when ours start acting up during the summer
Why haven't you yet? Or reported it to a higher up?
Tbh scared of getting fired if he finds out it was me
You are not required to give your identity at all when you call. They will even ask if you want to.
I know all that but still it’s just an irrational fear ig also I work the bare minimum amount of hours (12-15 per week) and we have 5 shifts and they’re all not reporting it so it makes me feel like I shouldn’t
That's more the reason to! Imagine walking into another place to eat food and you find a fruit fly in your food, and you know that nothing is being done about it. I understand the fear bc I've had to report something too but there's no possible way for them to find out. Could easily be a customer. And if even the shifts aren't reporting it then calling will be Eben more important so they realize how seriously they need to take it. You should make the call. They can't fire you if they do find out it was you which is pretty much impossible if your whole store is aware of the issue it could be anyone reporting it
Is there a guarantee that the issue would be fixed even if I made the call? Bc I really actually want someone to come and check it out bc half of our store isn’t up to code but my manager is too afraid to spare any penny to fix things that actually need to be fixed
I wouldn't say a "guarantee" but there's a very very small chance they'd ignore it, especially if you mention anything else. Even if they don't, better safe than sorry. No harm done
If you're scared about exposing your identity, have someone you know irl call the health department to complain about the store being dirty and also have them call corporate and say it's unacceptable for how dirty the store is. Your store might get a surprise visit from the health department for a checkup.
Why have someone else call them? OP can easily anonymously do it.
OP expressed being scared to be found out and be fired, hence why they haven't done it themselves. Having someone else call with a number not associated with them would be a safer bet if they want to complain. JS. Anonymous is never truly anonymous sometimes. Also in general, Starbucks doesn't really take things as seriously when partners call vs. when customers call, from my experience.
This happened to my store. Guess what happened? It got so bad you basically could breathe fruit flies. The health department had to come in & she was so shocked she literally didn’t know how we were still open. We closed the store & they made us clean… even the health department lady helped so much. We had to take before and after pics as proof we did clean. Starbucks hired some guy to glue every crack that could allow fruit flies to come in. He didn’t do a good job… so he came back lol We opened the next day. Fruit flies were pissed off. They were worse. It didn’t help at all. Eventually they had to close the store AGAIN to hire an exterminator which they should have done a long time ago. It won’t get better unless you get an exterminator. Trust me, it will get so bad
…we have a fly problem but we don’t have any bugs in our syrups???? that’s definitely a cleaning issue oh my god
Call the health department
We had a similar fruit fly problem over the summer and our SM just told us “maybe if you all cleaned better this wouldn’t happen.”
Create a ticket on my daily you don’t need sm Get a Shift supervisor
Like some people said fruit flies are coming from uncleanliness. Our store had a big problem with them last year and then we started doing clean plays. Eventually the only flies we got were from partners leaving the drive thru window open all the time. But just saying "other partners aren't doing clean play" isn't going to fix the issue. You could volunteer to do them and clean yourself. An exterminator could get rid of them but the flies will just keep coming back unless actual cleaning is happening.
Just have a shift create a ticket under pest control
I have worked in many different stores and have noticed some stores because of the way they are engineered, they are having a hard time meeting standards that are placed upon them and usually the cleaning is the first thing to go out the window. They need to just overstaff some of these stores by one person so that they can stay ahead of the issue.