Cans & Coins

Good afternoon from Butler & Bailey Market.

I hope everyone is doing well!  Everything is going good at the store.  We are all still enjoying good health, so I guess the measures we’ve taken over the last four months have been successful, or we are just real lucky.  Either way, I will take it!

Business continues to be good.  The supply chain for certain things has not caught up yet on various items, but we seem to have all adapted to using different products in the meantime.  One weird thing that is suffering greatly right now is cans.  Specifically, aluminum cans that soft drinks and beer come in.  You may have noticed certain varieties of each have been missing from the shelves for a while.  The companies all have the products, they just don’t have anything to put them in.

Another weird thing is coins.  Apparently, there is a big shortage on coins, which isn’t a big deal to the average person but for the store, it is huge.  We make change hundreds of times a day, so we use a lot of coins.  The bank recommended we round up or down to the nearest dollar if we run out of coins.  Somebody loses on that deal every time, and I’m pretty sure that somebody would be me.  I’m not going to tell customers I’m rounding their bills up!  Also, the way my luck goes, most of the transactions would land on fifty cents, so then which way do you round?  I guess you could flip a coin for it but…we wouldn’t have any coins to flip!  That would put you playing rock, paper, scissors for it, which would probably hold up the line, making every customer waiting behind this process mad.  So, we would end up rounding down every time and, in a business that just makes pennies on the dollar in the best of times, that’s problematic.  Maybe the bank that gave me that great suggestion will make up the difference?

Well, tomorrow starts the mask mandate countywide.  In my discussions with Martha Buchanan, I figured this was coming. I mandated masks for all of our employees several weeks ago, so not a whole lot is going to change for us.  That will not be the case for a lot of other folks.  I would say right now about sixty percent of our customers wear masks in the store and forty percent don’t.  I will be the first to tell you, I’m not looking forward to this next phase.  People are adamant for and against mask, and, after four months of being right in the middle of this virus mess and all the controversy surrounding it, I’m not real excited about being in the middle of this one.

I will tell you that it will make our staff’s lives a lot easier if you will have a mask on when you are shopping in the store.  We wear them eight hours a day, which is no fun, so I don’t think it is too much to ask if you will wear one the few minutes you are shopping.  My staff and I are not going to be the “mask police”, but I am pretty sure you will be reminded and shamed about a mask if you do not have one on.  I can show you a lot of emails where I have been reminded and shamed over things concerning this virus over the last four months, if you don’t believe me.  My staff can tell you stories, also.  

Tomorrow, you will see signs on the doors about the new mandate.  You will also see masks on a hanger, at the front of the store.  You are welcome to take one to use, if you don’t have one.  I want to make this as easy as possible for everyone, so please help us out by following the mandate.

Have a great Fourth of July weekend and thanks for letting us be a part of your community!

Tom Butler