US: 44.9M Cases - 727.7K Dead - 34.3M Recovered
Worldwide: 237.1M Cases - 4.8M Dead - 214.3M Recovered

Former Senior Loss Prevention Executive
Know of any fallen LP exec? Let's remember & recognize.

Private Industry Security Guard Deaths: 320   Law Enforcement Officer Deaths: 461
*Red indicates change in total deaths

One of America's Strictest Vaccine Requirements Approved in L.A.
L.A. to require proof of COVID vaccination at shopping center, indoor restaurants, salons, other venues
The Los Angeles City Council on Wednesday approved a new ordinance that requires proof of vaccination against COVID-19 to enter indoor restaurants, shopping centers, movie theaters, hair and nail salons and many other indoor venues.

The council was scheduled to vote on the law last week but held off when Councilman Joe Buscaino said he would withhold his vote after raising concerns about how the new rules would be enforced.

Under the new law, businesses must require proof of vaccination when customers enter indoor facilities starting on Nov. 4, including coffee shops, gyms, museums, bowling alleys, spas and a range of other venues. The requirements are set to expire when the city lifts its emergency declaration for the COVID-19 pandemic.

The L.A. rules allow customers to submit written exemptions for religious or medical reasons, but businesses must require those customers to use outdoor facilities, or to show evidence of a recent negative COVID-19 test if no outdoor facilities are available. Customers who have no proof of vaccination or exemption can still enter briefly to use the restroom or pick up a takeout order, according to the ordinance.

Businesses that violate the rules can face escalating penalties under the ordinance, starting with a warning for a first violation, then a $1,000 fine for a second violation, eventually reaching a $5,000 penalty for a fourth or subsequent violation. The fines would begin to be enforced starting Nov. 29, according to the ordinance.

Ahead of the vote, business groups raised concerns about possible confusion because Los Angeles County is imposing its own set of vaccination rules for many local businesses and their customers. The county order already applies within L.A. city limits, but California cities can expand on county orders for vaccine requirements. latimes.com

Retail Associates Dealing with Vax Mandate Rage - From U.S. to Canada to UK
Liquor store workers under stress & facing harassment enforcing COVID rules
Workers at the province's stand-alone liquor stores are facing angry and sometimes violent customers upset about new proof of vaccination rules, according to the union representing government liquor store employees.

Tracey Sauer, president of the Saskatchewan Government and General Employees' Union (SGEU), said the requirement for all customers to submit either a proof of vaccination or negative COVID-19 test to enter liquor stores is unfair and confusing to customers because it only applies to stand-alone retailers.

On Oct. 1, the province enacted a public health order requiring proof of vaccination or negative COVID-19 tests to enter many non-essential businesses, including restaurants, cinemas, gyms and stand-alone liquor stores.

SGEU represents 633 Saskatchewan Liquor and Gaming Authority (SLGA) employees, hundreds of which work at its 35 government-run liquor stores. Sauer said SGEU has received reports of angry customers verbally and physically threatening female staff.

"Retail workers at our SLGA stores have faced harassment by customers who had no knowledge that proof of vaccination was required to enter their stores. We noticed that our female members ... seemed to be getting attacked or approached differently than the men are getting approached." cbc.ca

NYC Retail Reeling from Pandemic Vacancies
An entire block of vacant storefronts: Delayed office return plans stymie midtown Manhattan's recovery
Many of the businesses that pledged to bring employees back to the office after Labor Day put those plans on ice, potentially into 2022, with the spread of the delta variant and a looming flu season. The delay has been particularly harsh on businesses in midtown, which has the largest inventory of office space in New York City.

As of this summer, nearly 30% of the retail storefronts in Midtown East and around Grand Central were vacant, according to a new report from the Real Estate Board of New York, or REBNY. That compares with a retail vacancy rate of 28.4% on Madison Avenue, and 20.9% on the Upper East Side. It's the highest rate of all of the Manhattan boroughs, REBNY said.

Pre-pandemic, REBNY estimates that the office population in Midtown East and Grand Central was supporting the 2,579 businesses, including eateries. The neighborhood captured about 11.4%, or $6.5 billion, of Manhattan's annual retail sales.

Today, REBNY says 93 of the retail storefronts are unoccupied. On one stretch of commercial real estate across from the high-end department store operator Bloomingdale's, former Gap, Banana Republic and Victoria's Secret locations sit vacant, leaving the entire block along Third Ave. between 58th St. and 59th St. street emptied out.

"These findings confirm the crippling effect that the pandemic has had, and continues to have, on the retail sector in midtown," said Fred Cerullo, president and CEO of the Grand Central Partnership. "For these businesses to thrive, they need the kind of foot traffic generated by tourists and office workers." cnbc.com

Will Store-Level Employees Be Next?
Nike to require vaccinations for US office-based employees
Nike will require all office-based employees in the U.S. to be fully vaccinated against COVID-19 upon return to in-person work, the company said in an email to Retail Dive.

Nike's vaccine mandate for office-based employees in the U.S. comes amid pressure from the Biden administration for all companies with more than 100 employees to require vaccination or weekly testing. That would include retailers' store-level workers, which have largely not fallen under the vaccine mandates companies have put in place.

Nike is not alone in requiring corporate employees to be vaccinated: Walgreens, Walmart, CVS Health, Saks and TJX, among others, have made similar decisions in recent months, but store-level employees and warehouse workers have largely been left out of such decisions. President Joe Biden's mandate that all companies with more than 100 employees require vaccination or weekly testing would change that, but retailers have already raised flags over how to go about carrying out the rule.

Currently, Nike is planning for an office return date of January 10 in the U.S., and said the vaccine mandate is "supporting the effort to bring people safely back to their workplaces."

The company did not immediately respond to a request for comment on vaccine requirements for its store-level employees and whether it is considering a mandate there as well. retaildive.com

COVID-19 & Employee Retention
How to Combat the 'Resignation Tsunami'
Employee retention has fallen significantly as the "resignation tsunami" flows through employers large and small. Nearly 30 percent of U.S. workers are actively job hunting, according to SHRM research, which also found that four out of five business leaders report it is taking two to three times longer to fill a position than in past years. So how can leaders ensure attrition doesn't become the most serious consequence to their business after nearly two years of leading through the pandemic?

Exercise Empathetic Curiosity

In The Surprising Power of Simply Asking Coworkers How They're Doing, author Karyn Twaronite, global diversity and inclusiveness officer at EY, the multinational professional services and accounting network headquartered in London, suggested that "when people feel like they belong at work, they are more productive, motivated, engaged and 3.5 times more likely to contribute to their fullest potential."

Communicate and Listen

According to a Workforce Institute survey, 32 percent of respondents claimed they yearned for more communication-both sooner and more transparently-from their employers, which is a primary regret for more than one third of C-level leaders.

One Size Doesn't Fit All

After months of developing new patterns of working, the workforce has been forever altered. It's naïve to expect that it can return to before-COVID-19 times. And yet, some organizations are trying to do just that. The reality is that people now have a new frame of reference. For employees who liked working remotely despite the distractions, they've come to realize what they were missing. They know what it's like not to commute for hours each day, to have the ability to run an errand in midday, see a doctor if needed or pick up the kids from school. They also know that they can have all of these benefits and still be equally or more productive at work. shrm.org

Working with Retailers to Expand COVID Testing Supply
Biden plans to spend $1 billion to increase the supply of rapid at-home tests
The White House on Wednesday is set to announce a billion-dollar investment in at-home rapid coronavirus tests that it says will help quadruple their availability by later this year, according to a White House official.

By December, 200 million rapid tests will be available to Americans each month, with tens of millions more arriving on the market in the coming weeks, the official said. The White House is also set to announce that it will double the number of sites in the federal government's free pharmacy testing program, to 20,000.

The changes reflect the administration's growing emphasis on at-home testing as a tool for slowing the spread of Covid-19. President Biden in September said that he would use the Defense Production Act to increase the production of rapid testing kits and would work with retailers, including Amazon and Walmart, to expand their availability. He pledged $2 billion to the effort, or roughly 280 million tests. nytimes.com

Massive COVID Test Kit Recall
Nearly 200,000 COVID-19 rapid test kits recalled over concerns of false positives
Ellume is recalling nearly 200,000 rapid at-home COVID-19 antigen tests out of concerns over an abnormally high rate of false positives observed from certain lots of its tests. Roughly 427,000 test kits, including thousands sent to retailers and some provided to the Department of Defense, have been impacted by the issue.

About 195,000 of these kits are still unused and subject to the recall. About 202,000 have already been used, the company said. Of those, there have been around 42,000 positive results, of which as many as a quarter of those positives could have been inaccurate. However, the company said it's difficult to determine an exact ratio.

Ellume is removing the affected product from store shelves and said distributors should cease distribution and quarantine those products immediately. abcnews.go.com

Australia: Sydney to exit lockdown next week after vaccination rate hits 70%

Walmart Wrongful Arrest & Discrimination Lawsuit
Two men speak for first time since filing federal lawsuit against Walmart over wrongful arrest, discrimination

Former Police Officer and Pastor Claim Wrongful Arrest: "To not to have a voice when you know you have done nothing wrong is a humiliating feeling."

Dennis Stewart and Terence Richardson went to Walmart to purchase a big-screen television but ended up with big problems. "We were two black men with a receipt," said Richardson.

It does not get more black and white than this for Stewart, a former police officer, and Richardson, a pastor. On Sept. 10, 2020, the two men were falsely imprisoned and racially discriminated against, according to a 15-page federal lawsuit filed in Houston in August.

Stewart attempted to return the television he purchased hours before. But the men said even though they had a receipt, they had to wait a while because the Walmart employees appeared to be skeptical.

Suddenly, Conroe police showed up. According to the lawsuit, they were paraded in front of other customers to a Loss Prevention Office where employees told police they believed Stewart and Richardson were trying to return a stolen TV.

A Walmart spokesperson released the following statement to KPRC 2 Investigates:

"We do not tolerate discrimination and take allegations like this seriously. When the claims were brought to our attention in April of this year, we investigated them. We are not getting into further detail given the litigation and will respond as appropriate with the court." click2houston.com

Walmart-Home Depot Delivery Partnership
The Home Depot Teams Up with Walmart GoLocal To Enhance Local Delivery Capabilities

The home improvement retailer is the first to join Walmart's new delivery as a service business

Two of the world's leading retailers are working together to expand same-day and next-day delivery capabilities for home improvement customers in the U.S. With Walmart GoLocal, The Home Depot customers have another option for same-day or next-day delivery on a variety of home improvement products.

The company will offer delivery with Walmart GoLocal in select markets in the coming weeks, with plans to expand to multiple markets across the country by the end of the year. Products that qualify for this scheduled delivery, including tools, fasteners, paint and other supplies that easily fit in a car, will have that option enabled at online checkout.

Walmart recently launched Walmart GoLocal to extend the retailer's expertise in local delivery to businesses of all sizes at competitive pricing. This includes delivery on a range of items, including those with size and complex requirements, as well as the flexibility to meet varying delivery timelines, such as express, same-day and next-day delivery. With Walmart GoLocal, businesses can focus on what they do best while leaving delivery speed and efficiency to Walmart. corporate.walmart.com

Environment, Health and Safety Webinar
Harley-Davidson's Safety Journey Using Technology to Control & Eliminate Risk

Thu, Oct 28, 2021 2:00 PM EDT

Several safety standards such as ANSI B11.0Safety of Machinery - 2020 rely on the foundation of risk assessment to support conformance. But how do you ensure you have an effective risk assessment? Not only does risk assessment have to be a cross-functional activity but it also must be documented throughout the design process and into the operation of equipment.

The webinar will showcase Harley-Davidson's safety journey using a digital EHS platform to control and eliminate risk, and also focus on the role of technology to support standardizing the cross-functional activities necessary for evaluation and conformance to the standards and allowing employees to have access to the risk assessments from a centralized platform. Click here to register

Retail Hit Hard by Shipping Crisis
Halloween stores haunted by shipping issues just weeks from holiday
With just a few weeks until Halloween, shoppers across the country are encountering bare store shelves and "sold out" signs online as they hunt for decorations and costumes. The lack of inventory is another consequence of the Covid-19-related shipping crisis crippling the global supply chain.

Historically at this point in the year, Spirit Halloween would have delivered some 90-plus percent of merchandise to its stores, the seasonal retailer's CEO, Steven Silverstein, told NBC News. But as of Tuesday, the company had only sent out around 80 percent, he said. The rest should be delivered by the third week in October - about a week before Halloween.

Spirit Halloween opened 1,400 locations and hired 30,000 employees this season. Silverstein said the impact of the shipping delay has been building since spring. nbcnews.com

Pharmacies with staffing shortages dealing with long lines, upset customers

Toymakers warn delays in stocking shelves could create a 4-month holiday hangover

Retailers locking in expensive shipping contracts that will likely outlast the pandemic


*Publishing Note: In observance of Columbus Day and in recognition of Indigenous Peoples Day, the D&D Daily will not publish on Friday, Oct. 8 and Monday, Oct. 11.
We will resume publication on Tuesday, Oct. 12.