BLACKSTONE, Va (WRIC) – Big box stores aren’t the only ones struggling with a worker shortage right now. Local businesses in small towns are also having to adjust to understaffing as well.
Crisman’s Appliance Center, located in the heart of Blackstone, is finding it hard to make service calls and deliver appliances because they’re short-staffed. They said they are missing at least two of their most important employees — their service tech and delivery driver.
“People just don’t want to work,” said Mary Lewis, the manager at Crisman’s Appliance Center. “When you don’t have the staff to provide that service, it hurts us locally.”
Lewis said they’re actively hiring after two staff members quit.
“If they call in sick or just don’t show up for work, or like some have just quit, you know, it’s hard to get that person that refrigerator that they need,” Lewis said. “So they’re putting things in coolers until that refrigerator can get there.”
Like other appliance shops across the country, it’s combined with an appliance shortage Crisman’s has dealt with since the height of the pandemic, although they’ve managed to keep a good stock.
Rather than close their doors, the store owners have adjusted how they do business.
“The owners of the store are daily scheduling the drivers, the service tech that we have at another store to help out with the ones here also,” Lewis told 8News Monday.
Lewis said no one has applied for the open positions. In the meantime, she says they’ll continue rotating staff from their other stores to be able to serve customers.
