Finally got out and went to Lowes today. Was very disappointed.

[KY_EnviroGuy]

Had few necessities for plumbing repair and wanted to pick up a few flowers for out front of our house. This is in north central Kentucky. I'm a 72YO male and high risk.

Despite all their hoopla on their web site about employee and customer safety, when I went in you would never guess there's a global pandemic happening at all.

* Only a small percentage of staff were wearing masks or practicing social distancing. Checkout clerk had no mask, eye protection or barrier shield.
* No social distancing signs as shown on web site and no directional aisle signs.
* The only indication of any concern whatsoever was an occasional goofy "we care" recording on the PA.

I was also shocked at how careless so many customers were although there was a higher percentage of customers wearing masks then Lowes employees, although most with masks were older folks like me. I sensed a low percentage of both customers and employees having concerns for social distancing.

So, after returning home, I wanted to raise some hell with Lowes about their disregard for safety. Although it was hard finding an email address for them, I finally found one on their corporate site. I'm writing them a nasty-gram tonight to outline my observations and to let them know I won't return under those conditions.

Earlier in the day, my son went to Kroger for our biweekly grocery run. Our store is roughly 5-miles from that Lowes store. The Kroger store requires customers to wear masks in order to enter and he said almost 100% of employees wore masks. They have directional aisle markers and cashiers have barrier shields.

What a contrast and what an unnerving experience for me.......

Any suggestions on anything special to tell Lowes in my email will be appreciated.

[sinkingfeeling]

1. I've been very pleased with Lowe's by ordering online and with

their parking lot pickup. Both times, the person delivering to my car had gloves and mask.

[CaliforniaPeggy]

2. I'd be inclined to be profane, but that probably wouldn't fly.

Remind them of what they promised, and that now, by not providing it, they are farking hypocrites.

The rest of what you said sounds good to me.

Best of luck!

[WhiteTara]

3. Same with Kohl's

I won't be back in a store that doesn't require masks. It may only give you 5 minutes, but that 5 minutes could save your life. I'm going to tell corporate I won't be back until the require masks.

[NotASurfer]

4. For Lowe's, not requiring customers to mask up creates an unsafe workplace environment

That was an observation one of the employees at our local Lowe's had. He said the employees figured it wasn't doing them much good to wear their masks; it might protect customers if one of the employees was infectious, but few of the customers were wearing masks so the employees were at constant risk of exposure.

I'd think that was a liability for Lowe's if an outbreak were tracked back to an employee who got sick on the job, and they'd care about losing sales or getting a reputation for killing their customers

[KY_EnviroGuy]

6. Thanks. It's a shame the employee feels that way.

A mask clearly keep people from getting infected in both directions, not just one. It's almost a certainty some employee of this Lowes will be getting sick with COVID-19 considering their daily exposure.

I wish there was a way that our local media was reporting the good guys (like our Kroger) and the bad guys (like this Lowes), perhaps side by side so the public knows.

I would try Home Depot next if I had to but I despise their stance on some political issues. They're the Hobby Lobby of hardware and lumber stores.


KY........

[UTUSN]

5. X-post from a GD thread about "quarantine fatigue"

Yip, the VFW bar - *nobody* with a mask (except me)
My first time out last night there. They had the bar-bar taped off with police yellow tape. The table area was down to half the numbers of tables, sounds good, no? Well, card table size, with four to a table close. About 15 total old (susceptible) dudes. You know, *tough* John WAYNE (draft dodger) dudes who had things to say about the FLOYD funeral on t.v., not positive if you know what I mean.

Yea, John WAYNE and police yellow tape - mucho macho!1

My preference is to sit at the bar, but I weaved through the tables to one. I was the only one with a mask and listened hard for any suppressed snickers.

Supposedly, restricting the bar is to protect the barmaid. Uh, it's a long bar and seats there could be much farther from one another than at the card tables. Plus the barmaid now brings the products to the tables, leaning into the crowded dudes, but it does provide them more opportunity to leer down her front, so there's that.

**********ON EDIT: Update, today I called the headquarters of the VFW, asked whether the individual Posts are autonomous unto themselves, whether the headquarters can put out a statement, something like, "We STRONGLY recommend masks/distancing because we want to protect our members (who are in the highest risk category), blah blah." The dude wasn't redneck, listened, said he wears a mask everywhere and doesn't care what others (including our fellow members) think about him for it, that it would take a Statement from the top dog officer of the state and that he will pass my comment up.

[ironflange]

7. I've been pissed with Lowe's ever since the "All-American Muslim" business many years ago

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-media-muslim-lowes/lowes-defends-pulling-ads-from-muslim-tv-show-idUSTRE7BC01D20111213