With the stay at home order in place here in Missouri, many businesses have closed down for the time being. Only the essential workers are still hard at work, and one of those jobs is fast food. As a worker in the fast food industry, I have experienced many changes firsthand.

To start off, we are required to wear masks and gloves. This immediately presents a problem as the gloves do not have as much grip as your bare hands. The masks present a problem with communicating with customers, as most people have some trouble hearing your voice through the mask covering your mouth. They are both very essential to working though, as you never know who could come through the drive through, and whether or not they are sick.

With the stay at home order in effect and not being able to hold more than ten people in an area, Dairy Queen has made some major adjustments. Usually there are at least 15 workers a night, but now there are ten at most, with most nights being less than that. The transition from being busy both inside and in the drive thru to being only busy in the drive thru has been a difficult one, but there really has been no room to ease into it, as every night has a couple hour stretch of a constant flow of cars coming through. There is never a dull moment while working here.

Just because we are super busy doesn’t mean the job is difficult though, and some would even argue that the job is easier as they are constantly busy and not just standing around. The workers I have been working with have been essentially the same people every night, and this has brought the workers closer and has helped the teams get quicker and more efficient at their job.

Overall, being an essential worker does have its challenges and major transitions; however, it’s still a fun job to be a part of and super rewarding to be able to help others out while getting paid.