Customers have inundated a Dubbo meat business with online orders during lockdown as they seek to protect themselves from COVID-19 and keep food on the table.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
DMC Meat & Seafood has been doing up to 160 home deliveries a day in what represents a jump of probably "1000 per cent", owner Mark Knaggs reports.
Other customers are ordering online or by phone and collecting from the front of the shop since Dubbo's first confirmed cases on August 10.
Mr Knaggs and his team have been putting in long hours in response to the surge in demand, with sales as much as doubling in the immediate period after lockdown was announced, he reports.
"My guys have been busting their bums," he said.
"We've had delivery vehicles working to 7, 7.30 at night, and for us, that's crazy, we normally have a 5 o'clock cut-off, but we're working those extra hours to make sure everyone gets their orders.
"The boys cutting the orders are starting work at 4 o'clock in the morning and pretty much doing a 12- or 14-hour day just to make sure every order is covered.
"My staff certainly have stepped up, which is brilliant.
"...I've always said I've got very good staff, but times like this just prove to me how valuable they really are."
As confirmed cases at Dubbo grew - reaching more than 340 by 8pm on Thursday - so did the city's venues of concern and the number of people being caught up as either close or casual contacts.
While the DMC team of 40 had temporarily been without about eight of its members, it had so far not been an exposure site.
"We've been just plain lucky, that's the only way I can put it down to," Mr Knaggs said.
"We're pretty stringent on our cleaning and whatnot, but it only takes one member of the staff or public to be in the shop at any certain time and cause all sorts of grief."
The owner of the business operating for 24 years said there was a bit of panic in the community straight after the lockdown was announced, but thought people now realised there was plenty of stock and that the store had the ability to do home deliveries.
"At one stage we were probably about eight hours behind in our home deliveries, but now we're all caught up, now our home deliveries is about a four-hour wait for a home delivery," Mr Knaggs said.
Every butcher's shop in Dubbo, every supermarket in Dubbo, their staff are just amazing, and it just proves it, out of this, how amazing they really are.
- DMC Meat & Seafood owner Mark Knaggs
The boss applauds his staff members and says managing staff and their mental well-being has been one of the biggest challenges in the Delta outbreak.
"Just to keep them [employees] on the straight and narrow and make them confident they can come to work and not take the virus home," he said.
"That's probably the bigger one, that's been the hard one this year.
"I'm sure every other business in town would echo those same sentiments.
"...Every butcher's shop in Dubbo, every supermarket in Dubbo, their staff are just amazing, and it just proves it, out of this, how amazing they really are."
Our journalists work hard to provide local, up-to-date news to the community. This is how you can continue to access our trusted content:
- Bookmark
- Make sure you are signed up for our breaking and regular headlines newsletters
- Follow us on Twitter
- Follow us on Instagram
- Follow us on Google News
Faye Wheeler
I have been a journalist for more than a decade and in that time I have been keeping Daily Liberal readers up to date about issues affecting them and what's happening in their community. Throughout my career I have covered a range of rounds and most recently I have been focusing on the business round.
I have been a journalist for more than a decade and in that time I have been keeping Daily Liberal readers up to date about issues affecting them and what's happening in their community. Throughout my career I have covered a range of rounds and most recently I have been focusing on the business round.
