OVERLAND PARK, Kan. — As high school and college students leave their summer jobs, retail stores are struggling even more with staffing. The owner of Pub Shop, located inside Oak Park Mall, said employee retention has never been this difficult during the store's 40 years of business.
Kelly Whitmer went from managing seven stores to three and is now at the brink of closing down another one due to staffing. She usually oversees about five to six people at her Overland Park location, but currently there are only three. She said once her employees who are in college return to school, she will have one other worker to help her out.
“We can’t get anybody, but it's pretty much like that everywhere. The mall hours have been cut, because nobody can get anybody,” Whitmer said. “When I talk to the other managers, they are all on the same boat. There isn’t anybody that I’ve talked to that say, ‘Oh we’re doing great.’ Nobody."
Many stores inside the mall are cutting back their hours or shut down parts of their operation. To make matters worse, they are all competing for potential workers. After putting out a call for applications herself, she only received two.
“If you don’t have anybody, then it’s me, because I’m the owner and I don’t wanna work open to close every day.” said Whitmer. “It’s scary because it’s going to be Christmas soon and you want to get your staff trained and up and running.”
Her stores have been struggling with employee retention for the last two years. She tried everything from word of mouth to a pay increase to printing out poster boards that read “HELP WANTED,” all to no avail.
After shutting down half of her locations, Whitmer said her yearly revenue has gone down by 20%. With retirement just around the corner, she is worried.
“I know a lot of people talked about unemployment, but I mean that extra — what was it, $600 a month? How long is that going to last somebody? Maybe an extra month or two? I don’t think it's that. I really don’t know. We can’t figure it out,” Whitmer said.
According to a national Bureau of Labor Statistics report, more than 93 percent of students aged 16 to 24 who are enrolled in school and looking for work, were employed either part- of full-time in July 2021. But as students head back to campus, that could change.
“Especially with COVID, there’s so many jobs opening and a lot of people, especially those freshly going into college, like I said, just don’t have the experience,” said Pub Shop employee and sophomore in college Delilah Chavis.
She said it may also have to do with many of them taking a break for vacation or wanting to spend time with family. She also knew she wanted to have a part-time job just for the summer.
“I’ve been working here for about a month or so. I started in the summer. One of my best friends, she actually referred me to work here,” Chavis said.
