I’ve recently been voluntold into managing the stores on the Sqn. Currently they’re a mess and generally we don’t issue much uniform from them. Does anyone have any tips as to how best to manage them?
Cheers
- Make a full and accurate inventory.
- If youre in charge of stores now.
Put everything you feel needs bining in a pile in another room and show your OC. - Issue kit out, dont hoard.
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I’d say just any scrap uniform just try bin and if you’re a small sqn who generally doesn’t get much new cadets then issues out spares maybe. Just box everything neatly and there can’t be any complaints
I’ve made a excel sheet of all our kit such as tents, Ruck sacks and mess tins etc. Make sure when it’s used by cadets that it’s signed in and out. Hopefully it’s all behind a locked door so items won’t go walkies.
If you are just in charge of uniform I found this useful: https://aircadetcentral.net/ACCDrive/Equipment/Uniform/Uniform%20Stock%20Checker.xlsx
Made it so much easier to know what uniform we have so I’m not searching each item for a certain size.
Also keep a copy on a memory stick so if any cadets need the next size up in uniform you can plug in and know if you have it in stores.
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Make sure that things tie up with the property book.
Get stackable storage crates, that fit on the shelves, label and use these for things as much as possible, they immediately tidy places. My garage and shed lay testimony to this.
Going against the suggestion do not try and catalogue uniform sizes too precisely, trousers and skirts especially lengths get altered, so go by waist size.
Oh and don’t get too anal unless you are going to be at the squadron every single night without fail.
The squadron is a working environment and people will need / use things and just leave them where they put them.
The bloke who notionally “runs the stores” at our sqn, works shifts and gets far too excited if people move or do things, which only just spurs us to do things, as it provides comedy moments as he has yet to fail to bite.
Marie Kondo the room: clear out anything which you don’t need
Air Cadet stores always seem to have a huge amount of stuff that never, ever gets used, but kept ‘just in case’.
If space is a premium, be ruthless. Bin stuff, give stuff away, eBay stuff. (Check with staff, but be prepared to advocate for your views.)
One example on one unit I was on: a pommel horse. But without a base, or the handles, just the leather horse bit and nothing else.
I asked why we had it and noone really knew, but they had had it before the new joint cadet centre was built, had stored it during the build, then moved it into a classroom afterwards, and noone had any memory of it ever being used in any way whatsoever.
So I sold it on eBay.
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Definitely not wooden?
Sorry, @Cadet04 - there is some excellent advice given above, but can I add, if you haven’t got at least a couple of wheeled clothes-rails, do try to get hold of those.
Go for masses of non-wire clothes-hangers (ideally wood, not plastic) and also stacking crates for belts/ties - they fail at hanging).
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We did consider those, but we have shelves (think Ikea style) and its a small room so it probably wouldn’t work. Why not plastic coat hangars though?
My question is “has it been used in the last year?”
If the answer is no - and there are no extenuating circumstances (“we usually do that once a year but didn’t last year”, “we’re waiting to get someone qualified” or “it’s a part of something that we’re trying to create but need more bits”, etc) then it’s usually time to bin, gift or sell depending on value.
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We actually donated a vast amount of warm clothing and fleeces to a homeless shelter this winter. They were very appreciative.
Break far too easily, and represent an actual risk from shards. And they’re excessively slippery, unless converted into Cadet Camp Clothing Hangers (which is much too awkward to make for your whole squadron clothing stores: they’re a personal DIY asset)
Wood- light/strong/indestructable/anti-wrinkle/eternal
Doing a chuck out unless everyone is there can be dangerous and costly.
Look to put things around the hut so that people aren’t constantly in and out of the stores. We have got filing cabinets and ordinary cabinets (locked) in classrooms with tools used for projects, maps and more recently flight sim bits and bobs. We used to keep the tools in the stores but it just became too much agg in the end.
I find it interesting that people talks about hanging clothes just takes up more space, especially using the wheeled rails so we have (as I mentioned) stackable crates with the uniform, other clothing, cookers, cleaning bits and sports kit in. I’ve seen people using the wheeled rails and just from a casual observation get in the way more than anything.
In our stores we keep the CWC bits they use, uniform, tents, rucksacks, kip mats, an ironing board, iron, OHP, AT waterproofs, cookers, sports kit, stock for “tuck” and cleaning .
Put small items in Tupperware boxes, again suitably labelled.
A lot of the time as with sheds and garages the appearance of tidiness’ helps soothe the mind.
Agreed - we essentially have three types of store:
- Clothing store which contains very little else, other than a few V&A items - as it’s a lockable room only accessible through the (usually-manned) office
- Training store cupboard in one of the classrooms, with most things used in classrooms in there (maps, demonstration items, first aid stores, etc)
- Command task, FT and AT stores located in the garage (appreciate that not all units will have this luxury)
…And remember; you can only bin/sell/give away that which you own.
It might be worth checking with your inventory holder as to which (if any) items of equipment belong to the service; and all gash uniform should be returned to your parent station for disposal.
it surprising (or not) how quickly the RAF write kit off. we had a need to empty our building as part of a temporary move.
Despite numerous tables, desks, chairs and cabinets the only items our parent station was interested in was the fire extinguishers and a radio battery conditioner (worth £2000!) the rest they said we could do with as we wished!
Depends on the unit - our wing HQ is currently full of old furniture because apparently the RAF wanted it back from a unit!
During my time as a cadet I recall regularly being told during clean-up days “We can’t get rid of this, this, this, this, this, that… because they’re on inventory”
When I took over the inventory as staff I discovered that we actually had very little on there.
I phoned stores and they happily wrote off 40 gash tubular metal chairs, two broken dustbins, and one fire extinguisher (previously removed by RFCA).
Don’t ever let anyone tell you that you can’t get rid of [insert old piece of junk here] because it’s on the inventory.
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When I was first handed the inventory when I became a WO, there were hand tools listed. had been a cadet and been on the squadron for 13 years and never seen these. I duly filled out the form, sent it off and 6 months later they were still there. The next time I went to get uniform I went into SCAF spoke to the Cpl who just deleted them. They apparently hadn’t seen the form, despite it being addressed to SCAF.