CRA President and CEO Rachel Michelin:
“I don’t know how businesses survive. This is my biggest fear. When we had our businesses shutdown we walked through the process to get businesses open. This dimmer switch- on and off- is really going to put businesses out of business. The challenge is we get very little notice when orders come out. There has been very little time to prepare. Businesses have spent thousands of dollars in PPE so they can reopen and now they can’t. So it is a difficult, difficult situation.
I am very proud of the retail industry and how seriously we have taken our part in stopping the spread of the virus, but unfortunately, when you have folks not wearing a face mask, not being respectful of other folks in a store, throwing parties, etc., businesses end up suffering. If you are going to be in a retail establishment, particularly these small retailers and independent owners, it’s respectful to put on a mask. Businesses are trying to pay their rent, insurance, employees and when you don’t wear a mask or you are disrespectful to workers when you are in a store, that doesn’t help anything. We need to get out of this, bring stability back to business and if wearing a mask gets us there, we are imploring everyone to wear one.”
