Deli Clerk Job Description: Template, Duties, Requirements & Pay (2026)

A deli clerk slices meat and cheese to order, builds sandwiches and trays, stocks and rotates the case, and keeps a busy counter clean and food-safe. Below is a copy-ready deli clerk job description template, a bakery clerk version for the same fresh-department hiring, the federal child labor rule that decides who may run and clean the slicer, and what BLS wage data says these workers earn in grocery stores.

What a deli clerk does

A deli clerk works a service counter. The shift is slicing meats and cheeses to the customer's thickness and weight, wrapping and labeling, making sandwiches, salads and party trays, stocking and rotating the case so the oldest product sells first, checking and logging temperatures, and breaking down and sanitizing the slicer and work surfaces on schedule. At the counter it is also a customer job: taking orders, suggesting products and keeping a line moving.

O*NET files "deli clerk" under food preparation workers (SOC 35-2021), whose tasks include preparing foods such as meats to customers' orders, taking and recording the temperature of food and storage areas, storing food in designated containers to prevent spoilage, and cleaning and sanitizing work areas and equipment. It also lists "deli worker" under fast food and counter workers (SOC 35-3023), which adds taking orders and serving customers. A grocery deli clerk does both, which is why the posting should describe the counter and the prep in equal measure.

In May 2025 the BLS counted 893,600 food preparation workers nationally at a $16.98 hourly median, and 187,430 of them in food and beverage retailers, where the median was $17.25. That is the market a grocery or specialty deli is hiring in, alongside restaurant kitchens that recruit the same people.

Deli clerk job description template

Copy this into your ATS or careers page, replace the bracketed fields and cut what does not apply. It opens with pay, hours and the age line because those are the first things deli candidates, many of them students, check.

Requirements: what to keep, what to soften, and what to drop

Requirement	What to know
Minimum age	Keep it if the role touches the slicer, and say why. Federal rules bar minors from operating, feeding, setting up, adjusting, repairing or cleaning power-driven meat slicers (see the next section). If you want to hire 16- and 17-year-olds, create a separate counter or wrap role that never uses the slicer and advertise it separately.
Food handler card	State the requirement that applies where you operate, and whether it can be earned after hire. Food handler rules are set by states and local health departments and differ.
Prior deli experience	Make it preferred. Slicing and wrapping are taught in days; experience from restaurant kitchens or any customer-facing job transfers.
Weekend availability	Keep it and be exact: "every other weekend" is a very different job from "all weekends." Vague weekend language produces quits once the schedule posts.
Cold environment	Keep it. Walk-in coolers and refrigerated cases are part of every shift, and stating it is honest.
Résumé upload	Remove it. Name, phone, age 18 or older (yes or no) and which shifts they can work are enough to schedule an interview.

The slicer rule: why a deli posting needs an age line

Federal Hazardous Occupations Order No. 10 (29 CFR 570.61) declares the operation or feeding of power-driven meat slicers, "including setting-up, adjusting, repairing, or oiling such machines or the cleaning of such machines," particularly hazardous for minors between 16 and 18 — "regardless of the product being processed," and the regulation's own example is "the slicing in a retail delicatessen of meat, poultry, seafood, bread, vegetables, or cheese." It names grocery stores and delicatessens among the covered establishments. For 14- and 15-year-olds, 29 CFR 570.33 goes further and bars operating or cleaning power-driven food slicers, grinders, choppers, processors and mixers altogether.

There is one exemption in the order: apprentices and student-learners employed under the conditions in 29 CFR 570.50(b) and (c). For an ordinary deli clerk hire, the practical rule is simple — anyone who will run or clean the slicer must be 18 or older, and the job description should say so rather than leaving the manager to discover it after an offer. Your state may have its own child labor rules as well. This is general information, not legal advice.

How to customize it for your setting

Supermarket service deli

Say which counter the role covers — service case, hot foods, sandwiches or catering — and how busy the peak hours are. Candidates want to know whether they will be on the slicer all day or rotating, and whether closing includes a full breakdown and clean.

Specialty and independent delis

Name the products. A shop that cures its own meat or carries a large cheese selection is looking for someone who cares about that, and saying so attracts them. Make product knowledge preferred, not required, and say you teach it.

Convenience stores and food service counters

If the "deli" is a made-to-order counter inside a larger store, say what share of the shift is food versus register and stocking. It changes who applies, and it changes whether the age rule applies to the whole role or only part of it.

Bakery clerk job description

Bakery clerks are hired by the same fresh-department managers, often from the same applicants, and a grocery bakery clerk role is mostly finishing, packaging and selling rather than scratch baking. O*NET lists "bakery worker" as a reported title for bakers (SOC 51-3011); in May 2025 food and beverage retailers employed 60,550 bakers at a $17.91 hourly median. There is a separate federal rule here too: Hazardous Occupations Order No. 11 (29 CFR 570.62) bars 16- and 17-year-olds from operating, setting up or cleaning horizontal or vertical dough mixers, batter mixers, dough sheeters, combination bread slicing and wrapping machines and cake cutting band saws. Lightweight countertop mixers of no more than 1/2 horsepower with a bowl of no more than five quarts, not hardwired, are excepted. If a bakery clerk role runs or cleans a floor mixer, dough sheeter or combination slicing and wrapping machine, the same 18-or-older line belongs in the posting.

If you are hiring rather than describing the job, our grocery store interview questions cover the next step for deli, bakery and other fresh-department roles, and the recruiting side is on our frontline recruiting page.

Writing the ad version

The templates are for your ATS and careers page. The ad on Facebook or Instagram answers pay, shift and store in two lines, and handles the age rule up front so no one wastes a trip. For example: "Deli Clerk — $17/hr, 1pm–9:30pm, every other weekend off. Main Street store. We train you on the slicer. Must be 18+. Apply in 60 seconds, no résumé."

On the form, ask the age question as a yes or no, then shift availability, then a phone number. Our pre-screening questions guide covers how to word knockout questions, and our help wanted ad examples library has worked examples for hourly retail roles.

Hiring for the meat case behind the deli? The butcher job description covers meat cutters, a skilled role with a different pay scale and the same slicer and saw rules.

Pay and employment for food preparation workers (SOC 35-2021) and bakers (SOC 51-3011), nationally and in food and beverage retailers (NAICS 445): U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025, via the BLS public data API. Tasks and reported job titles: O*NET OnLine 35-2021.00, 35-3023.00 and 51-3011.00. Child labor rules: 29 CFR 570.61 (Hazardous Occupations Order No. 10), 29 CFR 570.62 (Order No. 11) and 29 CFR 570.33, on eCFR. All read at source on September 28, 2026. General information, not legal advice. Cost per applicant: Boostpoint 2026 Social Job Advertising Benchmark, report-wide median (no role family covers deli or bakery clerks), advertising costs only. Cost per applicant is not cost per hire. Updated September 2026.