Trader Joe's President Addresses Flirty Employees

Trader Joe’s execs are clearing the air about whether the grocery store employees are instructed to flirt with customers.

In the latest episode of the Trader Joe’s podcast, Inside Trader Joe’s, co-hosts Tara Miller and Matt Sloan welcomed TJ's president Jon Basalone and chief executive officer Bryan Palbaum to chat about the future for the company, new products and answer a long-time rumor: Are employees told to be flirty or are they just friendly?

While chatting about the good natured-attitude Basalone and Palbaum look for in employees (called crew members at Trader Joe’s), Miller found the perfect time to segue into the topic. “Here's an opportunity to put something to rest because you're saying be genuine and be nice,” she asked. “Can you please tell us once and for all, are our crew members told to flirt with customers?”

Both the president and CEO were emphatic in their answer: absolutely not.

“Definitively, no,” said Palbaum, who has been with the company for 21 years. “I think we just have such a unique environment in our stores that, to go into a Trader Joe's store and feel that everyone is genuinely interested in whether or not you are having a good day, compared to maybe other retailers, I could see how that might be misinterpreted.”

Basalone agreed. “Bryan's right," he added. "I mean, you go through this world, and you run into so many people that aren't genuine, that aren't kind to you, that when you walk into a place when that's happening, it feels like, whoa, okay, I think they're flirting with me when actually, yeah, that's just what niceness feels like, you know?”

While customers might not find romance at the grocery store chain, they can rest assured that the friendliness at checkout won't end anytime soon. Trader Joe's has no plans to do self-checkout.

In a game of “true or false,” Sloan and Miller asked the execs to answer some rumors about the fate of the stores. Palbaum and Basalone were quick to reply when asked if self-checkout is coming soon.

“That’s as false as false can be," Basalone said, "because we believe in people and we're not trying to get rid of our crew members for efficiency sake or whatever the, I don't know what the reasons are people put self-checkout in.”

Questions about drive-thru coffee windows were also labeled as false, as was the idea for an in-store restaurants. 

ncG1vNJzZmiolaS9rbGNnKamZ6SnrqWx0WahqJ2jYr2zsdKim56mpGKupbDRnqqsnaNiv7a5zquqZp2dpbmwxcSeqmasn6GxbsDOZp2loaKperG7w5yYrKxdbIN6fphwaA%3D%3D