Zingerman's Deli

DEAR DELI FRIENDS,

It’s been over a month since we were asked to close our doors to you, our guests. It still feels surreal every time we walk into the Delicatessen, and your smiling faces are not there. Our mission continues to guide us during this challenging time: we want to share the Zingerman's Experience by selling food that makes you happy, giving service that makes you smile, in passionate pursuit of our mission, showing love and caring in all our actions and to enrich as many lives as we possibly can.

We don’t know how much longer this pandemic and its effects will last. We don’t know what our business will look like when this is all over. We do have certainty about a few things—we are grateful to our guests, staff, suppliers, and farmers for sustaining us; we are following recommendations and keeping safety measures in place; and we are still open and taking orders for sandwiches, groceries and prepared meals.

OUR DEEPEST GRATITUDE

Thank you for the outpouring of love and support you’ve shown us over the past weeks. Thank you for trusting us to feed you and your loved ones during this crisis. Thank you for buying sandwiches for our health care heroes. Thank you for keeping our staff working and knowing they are doing meaningful work. We miss you more than you know. The Deli just doesn’t feel the same without you here, but we really appreciate the smiles and warmth we feel from you at a safe, 6 foot distance. We hope you feel the love we are extending to you in return, from behind our masks.

We miss our staff that are not working because of this pandemic. We are hopeful that the federal and state aid will enable us to continue to take care of all of our crew. We are thankful for this help and for everyone who has supported us with their purchases, so that we can stay open and keep folks employed and insured during this crisis so there is work for everyone when things start to return to normal.

SAFETY MEASURES FOR YOU AND OUR STAFF

In response to the Governor’s order and recommendations from the CDC and Washtenaw County Department of Health, we have made a number of operational changes to keep you and our crew safe.

• All staff are required to complete a covid screening questionnaire before entering the building. This includes taking their temperature.
• All staff must also do a face-to-face check in with a manager before they enter the building.
• No one is permitted to work if they are experiencing any symptoms of fever, cough, shortness of breath, or sore throat.
• Anyone who reports these symptoms must self quarantine.
• We are keeping distance from you during the pickup process and doing no contact deliveries.
• Equipment and work spaces have been moved around, sometimes into dining rooms, to allow us to spread out to do our work with a 6-foot distance between each other.
• If we need to cross paths with less than a 6 foot distance, we do it quickly.
• It is absolutely OK for our staff to take longer at tasks and duties in order to keep this physical distance.
• We are all wearing masks while working.
• We wash hands and change gloves more than you can imagine.
• There are hand sanitizer stations throughout the building.
• We sanitize equipment, surfaces, and commonly touched items like staplers and phones, with a high concentration bleach solution many, many times throughout the day.
• There is a device on our doors that allows them to be opened by foot, instead of pulled by their handles.

LOOKING FORWARD

We benefit in this time of crisis by being a mission-driven organization that has a deep connection to our guiding principles. We already have a number of beliefs and systems we’ve developed over our many years that are helping us during these uncertain times—a strong commitment to training, the power of future visioning, assessing our energy and the energy of those around us, a dedication to continuous improvement. We will use these tools and resources to adapt during these uncertain times and to guide us to wherever we need to go in the future.

Many of you have asked us how to help Zingerman’s right now. Our answer is that you are already nourishing us in so many ways! Buy a sandwich or some groceries. Schedule a delivery of an At Home meal for your friend. Support Food Gatherers. Help feed our Health Care Heroes. Sign up for our e-newsletter. Follow us on Instagram. Leave a comment on a Facebook post. We feel your love and we’re returning it to you tenfold because Together We Are AmaZING!

💛

Be Well and Eat Well,
Grace, Rick & Rodger

Zingerman’s Deli managing partners