Margin Free Super Market

The morning starts early here at the supermarket on the road between Peroorkada and Nettayam. We usually have crates of milk and bread waiting outside before the sun is even fully up. Getting everything onto the shelves before the first customers arrive is always a bit of a race. Our location in M G Nagar is convenient for people living around Pothancodu, so we see a lot of the same faces every day. It’s a lot of work keeping the aisles tidy, especially when the school kids come in and move things around. We don’t have those fancy automatic checkout machines; we prefer to ring things up ourselves and have a quick chat with the neighbors while we bag their groceries. The floors get dirty fast with all the foot traffic, so someone is almost always walking around with a broom. We spend a lot of time checking the expiration dates and moving the older stock to the front. It’s a very physical job, standing on your feet for ten hours a day and lifting heavy bags of rice or crates of soda. The air conditioning works most of the time, but on the hottest days, it struggles to keep up with the open doors. We just keep our heads down and try to make sure we have what people are looking for. It’s a simple neighborhood store with no big corporate rules to follow.