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Working in Waitrose: From the cheese aisle to the trenches

‘Key workers’. The first thing that comes to mind is the NHS. But what about supermarket employees?

Being on the front line is not only working in a hospital, it’s risking your own health while you work to make sure others have what they need, and this includes all supermarket staff.

Supermarket workers were among the 1,300 people to respond to a survey of frontline staff carried out by Dr Rachel Sumners of the University of Gloucestershire. She told The Guardian:

“These people never thought they would be on the frontline of a pandemic. Your police officer or nurse, to a certain extent, they expect to be frontline. But a checkout worker or Amazon delivery guy, they never expected they would be getting spat on or shouted at”

Despite the fear of catching the virus, Waitrose workers Thomas Powers and Adam Hodges have tried to bring fun to their workplace, during a time of great stress, through TikTok videos.

@thatwaitroseguy

Trying to have fun on the front lines ##covid19 ##and ##trending ##blindinglightschallenge ##support ##fyp ##outofhours

♬ Blinding Lights – The Weeknd

@thatwaitroseguy

Like for part 2 😂🙌🏽 W.A.I.T.R.O.S.E ##boredvibes ##waitrose ##waitrosecheck ##fyp ##shopchallenge ##californiadreaming ##friends ##keyworker

♬ I’ll Be There for You – Theme From “Friends” – The Rembrandts

Thomas Powers said: “We wanted to bring a positive atmosphere to the shop and help everyone to have a good laugh”.

Their videos became an instant success online and many other supermarket workers around the country began to make their own videos.

The pair describe what it’s like to work from the frontlines of Waitrose during lockdown.

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