No Mask, No Entry

The signage was ubiquitous: No mask, no entry.

Across stores, spray bottles and rags were ubiquitous.

The message adorned every storefront of the Jackson Outlet Malls in Jackson, New Jersey, a glaring reminder of the coronavirus. I was with my parents in one of our first shopping outings in months. Retailers had been shuttered for nearly 100 days to mitigate the spread of the coronavirus at the peak of the pandemic. And while heading back to stores seemed like a reassuring step towards business as usual, the experience was a reminder that normalcy was still a distant reality.

In each store, retailers made clear that customers were welcome, but the coronavirus was not. I stood in line at Nike and Adidas, at a six foot distance from the next person in line, as barely a dozen people were allowed in the stores at a time. Customers were greeted with hand sanitizer dispensers as employees sanitized every surface with zeal. One worker hawkishly stood behind me to instantly spray and wipe a vinyl seat with disinfectant I occupied just moments before.

But what was almost as noticeable as the additions to the stores was what was missing: the people. While the shopping area wasn’t the ghost town it was just a few months prior, it was notably sparse for a summer Saturday. 

Customers wait for their turn to shop outside of the Adidas store. 

It’s no secret that retail shopping has been in decline, but the pandemic has accelerated the downturn. While e-commerce has become a more popular alternative, wandering the Gap and Old Navy as a child gave me experiences that clicking a screen could not, from the constant reminders from my mother — a current retail employee and veteran of the fashion industry — of how to spot quality in clothing or reminders to leave shelves neat to lessen the burden for retail employees. 

But as some of the largest brands go bankrupt and shoppers rely more heavily on Amazon, it seems that going to stores in person has fallen out of style. The old way of shopping could become another victim of COVID-19.

Mask-clad customers wait outside the Nike store, as capacity is capped to mitigate coronavirus concerns.