To mask or not to mask: That is the question Upper Valley stores are weighing as yet another wave of COVID-19 cases mount.
Some stores have already moved ahead in voluntarily re-imposing their own mandates, despite the verbal slings hurled by customers outraged at once again being required to wear a mask inside a store.
“We had a customer come in and harass an employee and say, ‘I’m never coming in your store again,’ ” said Curt Jacques, owner of West Lebanon Feed & Supply, which last week began requiring customers to wear face masks again inside the store.
“You try and do the right thing, and the right thing is not always the popular thing,” Jacques said.
With new, more virulent delta variant cases of COVID-19 rising nationally and regionally, and without the backstop of statewide mandates in New Hampshire and Vermont that were lifted earlier this summer, many stores are grappling with the question of how to balance to balance customer and employee safety with pandemic fatigue and a prevailing resistance to face coverings.
Jeff Peavey, who owns The Country Cobbler shoe repair and leather goods store in West Lebanon and sees a flow of customers come into his store because it serves as the drop-off and pickup location for dry cleaning, said he is warily eyeing the resurgence in COVID-19 cases.
“I was waiting to hear from the city if they were going to do anything first, but I may start now with the numbers starting to go back up,” said Peavey, who himself had COVID-19, as did his wife and son. “I just hate to force people to wear a mask if they’re vaccinated, but my wife works in the (Lebanon) school system,” he said, aware that even people who are vaccinated can transmit the delta variant.
Lebanon, one of the last municipalities in New Hampshire to lift its mask mandate, hasn’t yet moved to reimpose one. As of this writing, Hanover was the only Upper Valley community with a townwide mask requirement for indoor space, which it resurrected citing a “significant uptick” in new coronavirus cases at Dartmouth College.
The Hanover Co-op was the first major Upper Valley retailer to re-impose a mask mandate when it announced early this month that it was bringing back the policy after only 40 days.
Meanwhile, many big box stores and chain retailers — many of which locally are congregated along the Route 12A shopping plazas in West Lebanon — have begun revising their mask policies over the past couple weeks, although the mandates apply only to employees while “recommending” but not requiring masks for vaccinated customers.
Listen Community Services on Friday began requiring all employees and volunteers at its three thrift stores to wear masks again, said Eileen Lambert, development director at the Lebanon-based nonprofit. Listen is also posting signs on its doors asking customers to don masks in the store “out of respect for the health” of others.
Indeed, short of a government mandate, courtesy is one of the few mask-wearing inducements that store owners have at their disposal, according to Angela Moore, co-owner of Quechee General Store at the Quechee Antique Mall on Route 4 in Quechee.
Moore said all store employees wear masks, but “we are strongly encouraging our customers to wear masks and expressing our gratitude when they do.” That extra dollop of politeness appears to have an effect, Moore said.
“People want to shop. They want to stock up on things they haven’t had in a while. They want to see the scenery,” Moore said.
Located in the heavily trafficked Route 4 corridor between the Interstate 89-91 interchange in Hartford and Woodstock, the Quechee Antique Mall is a popular stop among tourists. Moore said it’s the busiest summer in memory as people have been itching to travel and revenge-spend after 18 months of the pandemic.
After taking down the sign that required customers to wear face masks earlier this summer, Moore hung a new sign requesting that people to wear masks went back up last weekend.
Over the past couple of weeks Moore said she has seen a “dramatic difference” in the number of customers wearing masks while in her store even though there is no outright requirement.
“I’m in the store right now,” Moore said in a telephone interview Wednesday morning, “and every single customer, over a dozen, every single one of them is wearing a mask.”
But as for a storewide mask mandate for customers, Moore said she will take her cue from the state.
“Vermont leads the nation in vaccinations,” she said. “We set an example. We are waiting for what the state says. We trust their judgment. If the state recommends it and we need to implement face masks, we will certainly do that.”
At West Lebanon Feed & Supply, owner Jacques said his store revived its customer mask mandate “because anyone can absolutely be a carrier” with the delta variant dominating COVID-19 transmission.
He would like to see Lebanon follow Hanover’s example with an indoor mask mandate; if nothing else it would provide cover from irate customers.
“That takes the pressure off business owners,” Jacques said, noting that pushback and rude treatment by customers has caused him “to lose a couple employees.”
But Lambert, from Listen, said she suspects that, based on current trends with COVID-19 infection rates, customers will be required to wear masks again. It’s just a question of when.
“I’m pretty sure we’re going to end up getting there,” she said.
Contact John Lippman at jlippman@vnews.com.
