We Should Be Hero-Clapping For Supermarket Workers

They’re essential workers who deserve more respect

“I’m not worried,” Yesenia Alvarado told me, putting a hand on her hip like the boss that she is. “First of all, I’m a mom — of three boys — I know chaos. If I don’t panic, everything is good.” Photos: John Taggart

Just a few minutes before 3 p.m. on Wednesday, Yesenia Alvarado arrived for her shift as manager of the Morton Williams Supermarket at the corner of Third Avenue and 63rd Street in Manhattan.

She was cornered nearly immediately by staffers and customers, all of them with questions: “Do you have hand sanitizer?”

“Is there toilet paper on the shelves right now?” Have you looked, is it there, now?

“Can I get a price check on pasta?”

And then, there were all the questions from me, a reporter standing there waiting to talk to her for a New York Times business story about the new challenges for supermarkets around the country. The gist of that piece is that stockers, managers, cashiers, and store owners are now “essential workers” at the front lines of the emergency during the COVID-19 crisis, sharing many of the same risks as cops, nurses, sanitation workers, and bus drivers, often with less guidance.

But how was Yesenia holding up? That’s what I really wanted to know. Wasn’t she scared… scared about all kinds of things? I know I would be. I knew that I was, and I only saw three people a day, not 300.