Working At Trader Joes During Covid-19

    Greetings audience! It's been a while since I blogged. I know I should be blogging more often, but now here I am. For this blog we'll refer to myself as Stephen Gaiber And Working At Trader Joe's During Covid-19. I feel inspired to write this blog about someone with Aspergers and experiencing how Covid-19 has impacted my life at both Trader Joe's and personally. I have been at Trader Joe's since 2012 and have worked at three different stores. I currently work at the Irvine Woodbury Town Center, store #210.

    I'd like to talk about how Covid-19 has impacted me with Aspergers. Everything I love has closed, including the movie theaters, gym, malls, restaurants, parks, my own pool and hot tub, and most especially travel. I've had to postpone multiple vacations, which has made me extremely mad and hard to function. I love all of those activities I listed, and it upsets me that I can't do anything. It makes me wonder if it's worth it to be healthy or whether I should take a risk, because I can't handle being bored in my apartment. It makes me look forward to work more, as I can see my amazing co-workers and it gets me out of my apartment.

     I have some amazing co-workers and managers. I have an amazing manager AKA mate above. They brighten our day and motivate us to come to work and do our best. They realize the stress that we are all enduring with the ever-changing policies. The thing that makes Trader Joe's special are the crew and the mates. I have made a bunch of friends throughout my 8+ years at Trader Joe's. I feel like we are all one big happy family. We do lots of tasks around the store, such as carts, bagging, register (except me), put up product on the shelves, some people write orders, and most importantly help customers with any questions they have. Our number-one priority is our customers, and we try to provide the best customer service possible.

    Let me tell you how crazy this pandemic has hit Trader Joe's. The pandemic hit us hard around mid-March in particular. We were out of everything. We couldn't even write orders. It was frustrating for both customers and the crew. Customers asked if we had certain products and we had to sadly tell them that we didn't. Fortunately the restriction of not being able to order anything only lasted a week. We have focused on sanitation of our carts and baskets. We have adjusted our hours, including reserving the first hour exclusively for seniors and people with compromised immune systems.

    Our customers have been very understanding and there for us. Some of them have baked us brownies and made us cards. This crisis has shown how good people can be. A lot of them are OK with waiting in line because of how much they love Trader Joe's. Life might be hard for me right now, but I am very thankful and glad to have Trader Joe's not only as a job, but as a place to go every day.