We're making it fresh, fresh is the best!

When telling someone I work as a mechanic at a bakery, I am often asked, " why does a bakery need a mechanic?" . I will give you a play-by-play of my daily activities once i get you familiar with what exactly it is we make at the bakery.

-The Place-

I work for Kwik Trip Inc., you know it, I am a co-worker. Kwik Trip is a chain of convenience stores located in the Midwest. There are more than 350 Kwik Trip stores, also Kwik Trip is a multi-billion dollar company who made more money than Sears last year, I bet you did'nt know that. Every day each Kwik Trip store receives a fresh goods delivery. The delivery contains things like milk, water, ice, and baked goods such as bread, brat buns, coney buns, and doughnuts. To Supply over 350 stores with baked goods daily you need a large operation that runs 24/7. All of Kwik Trip's baked goods come from the Kwik Trip Bakery located in La Crosse WI, and that is where I work.

-The Crew-

I start my shift at 7pm, which makes for a long night. After changing into a rather fashionable mechanic uniform,
I meet the rest of my crew in the maintenance shop. My "crew" consists of me, Jordan a graduate of the Industrial maintenance program at Western, and Iordan a Bulgarian immigrant who recently became a US citizen. Shortly after touching base with the previous crew we get to work. The three of us are a great team, Jordan and I bring great energy to the crew and Iordan brings years of experience and great humor.

-The Job-

The Kwik Trip Bakery has tens of millions of dollars worth of equipment, we " the crew" fix it when it is broken and prevent it from breaking. The first thing to be done is a "round" as we call it, it consists of a walk around the production floor to make sure all equipment is running and all the supervisors are happy. Once we have completed our round the daily chores must be done, greasing mixers, checking sensors and things along those lines. Assuming nothing has broken down on the production floor, we would start our preventive maintenance or "PM", this includes breaking down, cleaning and inspecting a said piece of equipment. PM can take between one and five hours depending on the equipment. The hardest part about of my job is when production equipment breaks down. When equipment is down, product is either being ruined or not made, either way the supervisors are not pleased. At times there can be great pressure to get equipment running again.

-The Characters-

As we all know, there are certain people in this world that can only be described as characters. The reason we call people characters is because it seems like they where pulled right out of some wacky movie. As is it with most people, there are many characters where I work. Characters are what keep the days interesting. Mad Dog is a production worker who likes to bark when he is happy, enjoyable to be around but can be really cooky at times. Crowman is a sanitation worker who can be termed as the biggest "hill billy" ever. Brother Karl is a mechanic on another shift who is constantly making odd sounds and laughs at anything and everything. B-Rad works with Brother Karl and wants to be the hero, B-Rad fixes things as fast as possible and makes it seem like the problem was much larger than it was. I am in no way complaining about these characters, without them the job would be dull and humorless.

All in all it is a good job, it is a stepping stone to greater things. For now I will continue to make sure the automated system at the kwik Trip Bakery is alwaise running smooth. Maybe after this post people wont ask me why a bakery needs a mechanic....
but i doubt it.