This week at ***work|http://www.christianbook.com/*** is considered “peak” week. Generally speaking, the months of November and December are “peak” months, since everyone is gearing up to do their Christmas shopping. But this week, we get the largest spike in sales.
This period of time is affectionately known as “The Season” around here, and lots of seasonal changes take place. We hire lots of extra help for the warehouse and for the customer service call center. Also, employees from other parts of the company are drafted to help out in the warehouse and call center. That includes me and my fellow developers. This season, I am spending about 8 of my 40 hours per week in a “picking” zone. The boxes for customer orders are routed around our warehouse automatically on conveyor belts, and they make stops in “zones” where they are filled with the appropriate products. I’m in what’s called a “fast pick” zone, which contains some of CBD’s most popular items in easy-to-reach shelves. I take the printed invoice out of a box as it rolls off the conveyor belt, look for the items that are in my zone, fetch them, and put them in the box. Repeat as needed. As the name implies, “fast pick” zones are fast-paced – I am constantly moving to grab boxes, products, etc. Here are some of the more popular products located in my zone:
***Veggie Tales Ultimate Silly Song Sing-Along|http://www.christianbook.com/Christian/Books/product?item_no=27895&netp_id=248583***
***2004 Wall Calendar, Painter of Light|http://www.christianbook.com/Christian/Books/product?item_no=418119&netp_id=302217***
***The Littlest Angel, Video|http://www.christianbook.com/Christian/Books/product?item_no=85861&netp_id=162947***
***God’s Promises For Women|http://www.christianbook.com/Christian/Books/product?item_no=5620X&netp_id=196855***
***The Prayer of Jabez For Teens|http://www.christianbook.com/Christian/Books/product?item_no=38159&netp_id=248933***
To get an inside peek at how our warehouse works, check out our ***tour of how an order gets processed|http://www.christianbook.com/html/Offshoot/tourpage1.html***. Some of the photos and screenshots are slightly out of date, but overall it will give you a pretty good idea of how things work!