shayde fischer sent a message to Doug McMillon that said:
Dear Mr. McMillon,
I currently at Walmart, and I have an idea that may or may not currently be planned to already start later on, but figured I should mention it if it's not. I tried mentioning it via email to my district manager, but lately, there's been a death in his family so I have not gotten any sort of response on who I show talk to about this idea. I don't mean to be rude by personally emailing you, but I figure he should be given the time to mourn his loss.
To be quite blunt, I expect COVID-19 will be a concern in the population for a long time. Let me explain with a background reasoning below here.
This is for many reasons including: 1) that even we get a vaccine in the near future, a certain of the population will be unable to receive it due to per-existing medical issues - this is actually a common problem with normal flu shots. Certain medical issues make can't get the normal Flu shot - I'm asked every time I get if I'm able to get it, due being epileptic myself, people with certain sub-types of epilepsy cannot get a flu shot due the medical issues involved. I don't have that issue, but many other people would have that problem, and I expect this will likely occur with the COVID-19 vaccine; 2) some people just refuse to get vaccinated anyway due to other reasons in the USA; and 3) COVID-19 is a virus, viruses usually don't have cures, purely due to how they function. There are often ways to minimize the effects of a virus or treat viruses, but there often isn't any form of an actual cure. We can cure people get sick with bacteria, but this because bacteria work extremely differently from viruses.
That's not even every reason I could come up with - these are just the main contributing factors. I know we sell medical masks in the pharmacy of every single Walmart, but l would suggest maybe the idea of selling "fashion masks", aka cloth masks, could be a large business opportunity for Walmart to do, both for children's masks and adult's masks.
This is because the pharmacy medical masks only can be used once each, and they often don't well on children. Many kids that are under 8-10 years old often have the sides of these masks showing their cheeks from the side - I notice this since my main department is apparel, and I have a secondary in Cap 2, often putting away the Baby supplies for my store.
Since these masks can only be used once each mask, it could be pretty inconvenient for the general public as most states require anyone over the age of two to wear a mask at most (if not all) businesses and/or in general public locations.
If someone wears a cloth mask, it can be used multiple times, can be washed, and can be designed actually fit well on a child. I could also image this working a seasonal basis quite well (certain mask designs could be based around holidays like the 4th of July, Christmas, Hanukkah, Halloween, etc.)
I've also noticed that some of our companies competitors already do this, like Target (their masks are just colored cloth masks), and Amazon. So, this would be a way to help keep up with them.
So, could you email me back about whether or not this idea is already being considered by Corporate Walmart? If not, maybe I can help with this ideq in mind.
