There are two boxes in the cooler.
One arrived yesterday.
The other? Nobody knows.
Fresh shrink doesn't always begin when product goes bad.
Sometimes it begins the moment product enters the backroom without a date.
A case comes through receiving. It gets stacked in the cooler. Another delivery arrives tomorrow.
Without a receiving date, yesterday's product can look exactly like last week's.
That's when FIFO stops being a system and starts becoming a guess.
The new case gets set on top. The older case stays underneath. The next person grabs what's easiest.
Nothing looks particularly wrong.
Until somebody finally pulls out the case that's been sitting there too long.
Shrinking it costs dollars.
Dating fresh inventory isn't paperwork for the sake of paperwork.
It's visibility.
A simple date written on the case gives every associate who walks into that cooler the same information: what came first, what should move first, and what needs attention before it becomes shrink.
Shrink happens one day at a time.
Make those days visible.