- Joined
- Apr 30, 2019
- Messages
- 1,206
There has been a panic-driven run on clinical face masks due to the coronavirus. A month ago, we had guests buy up our stock presumably to send to their families/relatives in China. These are out of stock at stores. Hospitals and clinics have short supplies. Manufacturers are trying to keep up with demand.
So this isn't exactly news, but do you still have guests asking you if there's some hidden supply of face masks in the back of the store? Sometimes these guests keep asking questions we can't answer, like "do you know when the next shipment is coming in" or "what other store has face masks in stock?" On a couple of occasions, I've overheard some of these guests shouting at an ETL over this. I don't know how many of these mask-seeking guests are actually shopping for themselves, shipping things to their own overseas relatives, or just hoarding up the stuff to resell at inflated prices on the black market.
Why in God's name can't Target put a sign in that part of the store plainly stating: "Dear Target Guests, due to massive demand associated with the international coronavirus situation, we are temporarily out-of-stock on face masks. We will attempt to obtain face masks as soon as supplies are available. Thank you for your understanding and for shopping at Target"
But that's probably too much too ask of Corporate. If Corporate had the willpower and common sense to actually produce a sign, they'd probably "apologize" to the guests even though there's nothing for Target to apologize for. What we have here is a short-term supply-and-demand crisis caused by an international health crisis, not a situation caused by Target. More importantly, I imagine that the manufacturers of face masks not only are working serious overtime to meet demand, but their contracts require that in an emergency situation their first priority is to supply health care institutions and governmental/military organizations, secondary priority to supply retail stores.
So this isn't exactly news, but do you still have guests asking you if there's some hidden supply of face masks in the back of the store? Sometimes these guests keep asking questions we can't answer, like "do you know when the next shipment is coming in" or "what other store has face masks in stock?" On a couple of occasions, I've overheard some of these guests shouting at an ETL over this. I don't know how many of these mask-seeking guests are actually shopping for themselves, shipping things to their own overseas relatives, or just hoarding up the stuff to resell at inflated prices on the black market.
Why in God's name can't Target put a sign in that part of the store plainly stating: "Dear Target Guests, due to massive demand associated with the international coronavirus situation, we are temporarily out-of-stock on face masks. We will attempt to obtain face masks as soon as supplies are available. Thank you for your understanding and for shopping at Target"
But that's probably too much too ask of Corporate. If Corporate had the willpower and common sense to actually produce a sign, they'd probably "apologize" to the guests even though there's nothing for Target to apologize for. What we have here is a short-term supply-and-demand crisis caused by an international health crisis, not a situation caused by Target. More importantly, I imagine that the manufacturers of face masks not only are working serious overtime to meet demand, but their contracts require that in an emergency situation their first priority is to supply health care institutions and governmental/military organizations, secondary priority to supply retail stores.
