• Craft stores like Hobby Lobby, Michaels, and Joann Fabrics are fighting to stay open in states with more lenient definitions of "essential" business, highlighting troubling inconsistencies in the US approach to curbing the coronavirus outbreak. 
  • Though craft stores are just a microcosm of the retail landscape, their collective push to bypass closures is showing the danger of a lack of a unified approach in defining essential versus nonessential business. 
  • "We are nonessential and yet we are still open," a Joann Fabrics employee told Business Insider on the basis of anonymity. "It's disgusting to see this company prey on vulnerable people with good intentions who want to help. All they care about is money."
  • Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

After nearly 100 major retailers closed their doors to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, one sector has remained noticeably absent from the effort — craft stores. 

Top executives at Hobby Lobby, Joann Fabrics, and Michaels fought ruthlessly this week to leave doors open across the country, instructing employees they provide "essential" services while refusing to offer sick leave pay and benefits. In a series of memos obtained by Business Insider, each of these companies attempted to justify staying using a smattering of dubious claims ranging from a need to "serve the makers" to a message from God. 

And they didn't stop there. At Hobby Lobby, executives instructed managers to "make every effort to continue working the employees." At Joann Fabrics, its CEO made false claims that major US hospital systems had asked the company for help with materials for masks and gowns, which they denied. At Michaels, company leaders told workers they were "fundamental" to serving business owners, teachers, parents, and communities "looking to take their minds off a stressful reality."

Spokespeople for all three companies did not respond to Business Insider's multiple requests for comment this week. 

Though craft stores are just a microcosm of the retail landscape, their collective push to bypass closures spotlights troubling flaws in America's ad hoc approach to curbing the spread of the coronavirus. As countries around the world enforce restrictive national lockdowns, the US has failed to build a unified strategy to fight the outbreak on everything from air travel to standards around essential versus nonessential business. 

In turn, craft stores are exploiting these inconsistencies in a ploy to stay open: By the end of this week, stores had temporarily shuttered in a handful of states but not others, where business appears to continue as usual. This erratic approach has led to a growing mass of angry workers and consumers who are speaking out against corporations putting profit ahead of public safety and the state officials that have failed to intervene. 

'We are nonessential and yet we are still open'

In the US, each individual state holds autonomy in defining which businesses stay open, though there is a universally accepted list of business deemed "essential," including grocery stores, pharmacies, and health care centers. While big-box stores like Walmart and Target fall within this category, craft stores are notably not on the list, nor are they included in guidance issued by the Department of Homeland Security. 

Still, that hasn't stopped Hobby Lobby, Michaels, and Joann Fabric from leaving stores open in states with more lenient delineations around what constitutes essential commerce. Even in the case of states with stricter mandates like New York, inconsistent policies and lack of communication between state officials and corporate leaders have caused employees to receive conflicting information as to whether or not they should be reporting to work.

A Joann Fabrics employee based New York — who requested anonymity to protect her job and whose employment status was confirmed by Business Insider — said her manager told her on Monday he received approval to open the store, despite Governor Andrew Cuomo's orders that required competitors like Michaels to close their doors.

"I have no idea if the approval was from the state or from corporate," she wrote in an email to Business Insider. "I'm not sure what's going on at all. I've been completely left in the dark. Pretty much everything is confusing and no one really knows what's happening." 

The employee — who works at a store in Long Island, part of a region health officials have named the epicenter of the coronavirus in the US, with more than 30,000 confirmed cases — said her customer base is "overwhelmingly elderly" and "the most at risk."

"We are nonessential and yet we are still open," she said. "It's disgusting to see this company prey on vulnerable people with good intentions who want to help. All they care about is money. I'm young and healthy, I don't fear for my own life, but what if I'm unknowingly infecting others?"

Less healthy employees, however, say feel they are at risk of getting sick themselves at work.

A Joann Fabrics employee battling a heart condition, which places him in the high-risk category, told Business Insider he doesn't feel safe at work, where customers are failing to adhere to social distancing protocols.

On a recent shift, he said he counted 57 customers that came through his line in three hours, some making purchases of just one item. Others left the store without buying anything at all. 

"As [Joann is] claiming to be essential and helping people's health, one customer bought a bottle of hand soap, a terracotta pot, and a saucer," he said, speaking on the basis of anonymity to protect his job. "Another bought one plastic crochet hook. These piddling purchases make me very irritated. It's like, this is why we're exposing ourselves?" 

Joann Fabric
A Joann Fabrics store.
Joann

'Crafts are not worth someone's life'

For craft store employees who have been forced into the frontlines of a global pandemic, many are finding not only are their options limited when it comes to paid sick leave, they also have almost no protections on the job. 

Take Hobby Lobby, which just laid off 20% of its part-time and seasonal staff in states where they were forced to close, while simultaneously slashing the salaries of salaried full-time positions by 10%. The company also reversed a former policy that required employees to first use up remaining paid time off and vacation days first in the case of illness or quarantine, but still only gives employees 75% of their rate of pay based on an average of recent shifts.

"The managers have been instructed not to warn employees until it happens, and to not tell other stores at risk of closing down," a Hobby Lobby manager wrote in an email to Business Insider. "[This makes] it harder for employees to receive aid because it will come out of nowhere and they will go from 'report back to work in a few weeks' to 'you're fired.'" 

When it comes to safety on the job, employees at all three companies told Business Insider they have not been provided with proper protections like masks and gloves. Further, one Michaels employee speaking on the basis of anonymity to protect her job, said her store has not been provided with precautions hand sanitizer and noted that cleaning supplies "are scarce." 

"I am asked on a daily basis by customers why we are still open," she told Business Insider this week. "We ask ourselves the same thing. We clearly aren't important to our CEO. He is putting his hardworking employees and customers are risk."

In response, customers and enthusiasts of each store have rushed to the side of employees on social media, taking to the comments to call out executives for not shuttering stores and calling on consumers to boycott the company. A March 23 post on the Joann Fabrics Facebook pagecurrently has more than 600 comments, nearly all of them questioning Joann's status as an essential business and urging for store closures. 

"[Joann has] endangered so many people already," the Joann employee who works in Long Island said. "Crafts are not worth someone's life."