Renee, an average height woman, with medium red color hair, dressed in a black pant and black t-shirt which imprints “FUEL ON” in the simple red font on top left side. She always carried a bright smile on face and a wedding ring. “I have been married for 30 years to the only man whom I dated in my life. And have 3 children……oh they are great kids”, she said; with little prove on her face while shifting her left hand to her lap. “I always worked in the restaurant business, after my father got retired; I and my sister opened a business of our own with my father’s help. I started working on Fuel On about 3 years age ago as a cashier and then became manager here and it’s terrific”, she took a deep breather with small pause and continue “Usually in the restaurant business you have same customers every day, here you see new faces every day, which is a lot nicer”.
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| figure 2 |
The first thing you see when you enter the door is the notice on the big glass door, says “Under 18 No Tobacco… We Card……Please Have ID Ready” (figure 2). Then as you enter the big glass door, it feels like you are standing under morning sun rays in some kind of coffee garden. After a first breath, you wanna move to the deli (food court) to get the bit of breakfast sandwich. As you walk through the cash register, all the Weis chips, popcorn's, coffee cakes and the stick of beef walk with you through the counter where a cashier with a bright smile says, “GOOD MORNING ….How Can I Help With Today?”
As you approach the right of the cash counter, you will see Coffee station, the first thing you notice is the cleanliness of coffee station. Usually, when you go the convenience store where customers have to make their own coffee, it's always mess. But this was something different, to the extended that you even wouldn’t find sugar on a counter. Once a customer took a coffee cup and came up to one of the cashier Lisa and asked, “Can you help me with you coffee Price?” Lisa was wearing her Fuel On t-shirt, tall, blonde hair and a beautiful smile on her face said, “Yes, sure Sir, We have 4 size cups here… (Moving toward the cup) 12 oz for $1.09…….16 oz for $1.39…....20 oz for $1.49 …….. 24 oz for $1.59 and refill for $1.09. We have a regular, decaf, dark magic and pumpkin spice, and that’s seasonal. Anything else you wanna know?” A customer asked for Thanks while holding a big smile and 20 oz cup (figure 3).
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| figure 3 |
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| figure 4 |
“Our busiest day is Tuesday, we don’t even have time for the lunch break or smoke breaks”, said Renee as she continued wearing gloves to help her employees in a deli. They had six people standing in line wearing almost same kind of clothes, blue pants, and blue sweater, hard toe shoes and some were wearing the fluorescent vest and hard hats, waiting to give order and running to opposition side of the food court to get a drink as fast as possible. “On Tuesday, we have SPECIAL offer of 2 FOR TUESDAY ….. Any TWO 12” SUBS for $9.99” (figure 4), talked while making a sandwich. “We also have phone order service … mostly industrial employees order on the phone as they don’t want to wait in big lines because they have just half hours lunch break. We get 10 to 12 sandwich order on the phone, for which one employee should be on a computer and two employees to make sandwich” explained Renee while asking cheddar chess from her employee. “Once a customer scans our menu on the big board, back wall of the food court and said isn’t you sandwiches and pizza prices are high, where I live I can get this food at half price. Customer standing beside her said, “Mam, you should visit New York, you will get this same food at double price and not as delicious as this place”.
“I cannot see people struggle, it hurts me……. 22 people work for this store, some are really good and …… some are not that good, so we just have to keep them all in line and sometimes the good ones got forgotten because bad ones are always wanting attending, so sometimes you have to give good one some attending too, you have to remember that” Renee said and continue “I believe every person have opportunity…… (Took a little break) I wish they took advantage of that opportunity in life. Some employees here are full time and some are part time. Part-time employees are as passionate as full-time employees for work, they all work in a group to finish their job” she explained. “I believe not matter how much money they make, their work is a reflection of who they are.”
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| figure 5 |
“I love working here, it's fun working, the only hard and fun part of this job is that sometimes you have deal with some customers who are impossible to deal with”, said one of the cashier in black pants and black Fuel On t-shirt; she continue her talk while making coffee……. “Like once I waited on one customer who asks I’m hungry what special deal you have, so I said we have big wise chips for $2.00, small pack for $.99, we have cheap food over deli… He said I don’t want to have chips and I didn’t like you food menu……I said OK, we have really good coffee and fountain soda or orange juice and ice tea are 2 for $1.00…….. I don’t want coffee and drink, just give me 1 pack of Newport 100’s” cashier said while rolling her eyes and small laugh on her face. (figure 5).
“People are there to just get their gas, smoke, bit of food and wanna live, they are not there to hassle” Miss Renee said. “Can you play my lottery numbers please?” said a big man, much louder that you can here to the end of the store; who had blue jeans and black hoody on and wore a white beard and round reading glasses. Hand $20 bill to cashier for gas and then went to get coffee, till one of the cashier played his lottery numbers. He walked to coffee cake station grab his cake and came upon to cash counter. “How much it came up to?” he asked…. cashier said $36…… play me $4 dollar Cash 5 (lottery), which make $40 and how much with coffee and cake, he asked. He paid for his things, he ask small bag for cake and turned to leave, and at the exit door he screamed “THANK YOU HONEY! SEE YOU TOMORROW” and left with the big smile on his face which reached up to his ears.
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