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Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. Now, a call-in for retail workers ahead of Black Friday, the other thing that we observe many people do this week. What do you expect work to be like for you on Friday? What would you like your customers to know before they show up? 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692. There are so many stories of people just being rude this year in restaurants and in stores, that we thought you might like the chance to preempt some of that at least for Brian Lehrer Show listeners who, okay, they are polite. You're a polite group, I think, unusually polite. Society goes in general but not everybody.

If you're working retail on Friday, tell our Brian Lehrer Show listeners, your fellow Brian Lehrer Show listeners. What you would like them to hear before they show up in your Black Friday stores? What do you expect work to be like for you on Friday? What would you like your customers to know before they show up? 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692.

Or are you planning to call in sick or even go out on strike? I asked that part of the question because there's been so much news this year about disruptions in the supply chain that'll complicate black Friday and Cyber Monday, but here's another possible disruption. Workers strikes. Have you heard this yet? Amazon workers in 20 countries plan to strike on Friday as part of a Make Amazon Pay campaign to improve working conditions. There's talk of other retail workers strikes like the Black Friday Blackout, one of them is called.

All of this, of course, happens against the backdrop of the great resignation, where so many retail workers have quit their jobs, quit in droves this year because it wasn't worth the low pay for all the abuse and all the pandemic precautions you had to take every second and everything else. We are opening up the phones for retail workers. Are you working this Black Friday, or are you participating in one of the strikes being organized, and whether you're striking or not? What do you want shoppers to know before they walk into a store?

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Brian Lehrer, WNYC. Ahead of the Black Friday hoards, this call-in is for you, retail workers, or even store owners, I see we have at least one store owner calling in, that's okay. 212-433-WNYC, 433-9692. What do you want shoppers to know before they show up? Are you working or are you striking? Andrew in Princeton, you're on WNYC. Hey, Andrew.

Andrew: Hey thanks for having me. It's great to be here. Appreciate you taking my call.

Brian Lehrer: Working Friday, and if so, where?

Andrew: Starting at 6:00 AM, bright and early tomorrow morning, at a chocolate factory out of Windsor, New Jersey, Princeton area.

Brian Lehrer: Is that earlier than usual opening time?

Andrew: It is. It's usually 9:00, but I'll be ready to go get some coffee. I'll be ready to go at 6:00.

Brian Lehrer: Chocolate for breakfast, and maybe they'll save some for their gifts. What do you want to tell the shoppers who are going to come in or what are you anticipating?

Andrew: I'm anticipating a great day. I've seen more and more people out shopping. I'm happy to see it. I hope everybody else feels the same way. We're lucky to be here. We're lucky to have jobs and in a great economy, so let's keep it going. We all have a job to do. Let's get in there, make it work, and keep this place going.

Brian Lehrer: Andrew, upbeat as our first caller. It certainly is good to see people able to go back and shop in person more than before. How about Charles on Staten Island? Charles, you're on WNYC. Hi there.

Charles: Good morning. I have one thing to say to people, please wear a mask. It will protect you and it will protect everybody else. If I had to say something else it's, try to be nice to everybody else in the store because we're all trying as hard as we can to make your day a good day.

Brian Lehrer: Thank you, Charles. We should play that over and over and over and over and over again between now and Friday. Brittany in Ridgefield, Connecticut, you're on WNYC. Hi, Brittany. What are you anticipating on Friday? You can shout out your shop if you want.

Brittany: I actually wanted to shout out a shop. I'm here in Ridgefield, Connecticut, and the best wine and cheese shop here is 109 Cheese. I was in there, a little marketplace yesterday and actually got accosted for my two-year-old having a mask on, and the shop owners came out and they helped me immediately and really diffuse the situation. It was such a reminder of what these shop owners have to deal with day in and day out. I hope everyone is kind, and I would just love to say, if you're in near Richfield, you should frequent the shop because they take such great care of their customer.

Brian Lehrer: That's very nice. I think I misinterpreted and therefore gave misinformation to the listeners. I thought you were the owner of the shop, but you were calling to thank the owner of another shop.

Brittany: I'm calling to thank the owner of the shop, who saved me from a man screaming at my two-year-old for having a mask on.

Brian Lehrer: Brittany, thank you very much. Here's to many fewer of those kinds of incidents that people need to be rescued from. Here's Pat in Bushwick. Pat, you're on WNYC, and you actually own a store, right?

Pat: Yes. My wife and I and a friend own a secondhand buy-sell-trade clothing store in Ridgewood, Queens and we will be buying clothes from the public that day and giving them cash or store credit. I'm with all the store owners out there who are politely asking customers to just respect the fact that we're operating a shop and we're trying to recycle clothes and give people a great deal and business is great, but please wear your mask, and we're not here to get sick for the anti-masker in the house.

Here's another thing. Put your mask on before you come into the shop, don't put it on in the shop. That's always confusing me. We've really fought throughout the pandemic, like there's been people who've called the police on us for making them wear their mask. All the retail workers out there, respect them because they've gone through hell and high water to bring these services to you, and our workers are the best ones. Anyway, go ahead, Brian. Sorry.

Brian Lehrer: Now you said you're going to be buying some things from customers as well as selling things to customers on Friday. Is that right?

pat: Correct, yes, yes. We run a second-hand buy-sell-trade clothing store. If you have fall fashions or winter fashions that you can't fit in anymore because of the pandemic or you're just done wearing them, we will look at them and then pay you cash or credit and then put them back out on the floor and resell them. It's such an awesome thing to be in the full circle economy and not creating waste and combating the sins of retail prior to this point and the fashion industry at large. It's a great business.

Brian Lehrer: There you go. Say again the name of your place and where it is.

Pat: Fittingly, it's called Other People's Clothes, and it's in Ridgewood, Queens at Woodward and Catalpa

Brian Lehrer: Pat, thank you very much. Happy Thanksgiving, happy Black Friday. By the way, somebody just tweeted a little history of Back Friday. I think this is accurate that retailers in the 1980s called it Black Friday to connote the day that retailers went into the black for the year. In other words, so much of a store's revenue often takes place during the holiday season and that big shopping day just after Thanksgiving that they used to kick it off. It seems like it starts earlier now, was the day that they first went into the black after being in the red for the whole rest of the year leading up to that. I believe that's the origin of black Friday. As we have time for a few more phone calls from retail workers ahead of black Friday, what do you expect work to be like for you? What would you like your customers to know before they show up? 212-433-WNYC, 433-9692. How about Joe in the East Village. Joe, you're on WNYC. Hello.

Joe: Hi. Am I on the line?

Brian Lehrer: Yes, that's you, hi.

Joe: Hi. I'm just like to let everybody know, we have a brand new store that's on 9th Street in the East Village selling vintage and unusual gifts, and we're looking forward to seeing all that our neighbors and friends in the East Village.

Brian Lehrer: Very good. What might people get there?

Joe: We've got an interior design studio here for years, so it's unusual things that have been collected the last 20 years, vintage glass, vintage lamps, wonderful candles, cards, you get it gift-wrapped and you can walk out with it and you're not waiting for a box.

Brian Lehrer: Joe, thank you very much. Hope you get a lot of people in there. Dan in Westchester, you're on WNYC. Hi, Dan.

Dan: Hi, Brian. Thanks so much for taking my call, and happy Thanksgiving to you and everyone else. I have two comments I want to make. First of all, I am a retail worker and I will be working on Black Friday starting at 7:00 AM. I work at a clothing store in the Ridge Hill Shopping Center in Yonkers. It's great. I love my colleagues. I like my bosses.

I anticipate people will be somewhat frustrated because I don't think we're offering the kinds of sales that people are hoping to find, which I think is something that a lot of people experience, but more so the reason I called this to make a comment about working conditions, in general, all over this country, specifically in the service and retail sectors. That is we can organize a withholding of consumption by buy nothing day or other things that have happened over the years, but it's so hard for workers to get better conditions for themselves and for other people in their industries without systematically withholding their labor in the form of strikes or other actions.

I just want to give a shout out to every workplace and every set of workers all over the country who are attempting to do this in a time when organized labor is in a really dark place in this country, and I myself would consider organizing if it weren't so darn difficult to do so, and I hope to potentially have the opportunity to do that again.

Brian Lehrer: That is a great way to end this call-in, Dan. Thank you very much for the thought, and thanks again to all of you for being there. Happy Thanksgiving. We will be on tomorrow with a Thanksgiving special selections from our Iconic at 50 series, music from 1971 that still matters today. Enjoy it tomorrow morning, and happy Thanksgiving.

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