It may not be considered the front lines, but many warehouse employees are working just as hard during the Covid-19 epidemic to keep our essential businesses going. They’re doing the jobs that cannot be done from home: powering the machines, packing the boxes, overseeing production, checking inventory and ensuring quality control. We need these workers, and we greatly appreciate that they risk getting sick every day they show up for work.

To our own Blackhawk warehouse employees: Thank you! Thank you for showing up for work. We appreciate this now more than ever. Thank you for working so hard. Thank you for keeping a positive attitude. Thank you for being the backbone that keeps our business running. Thank you for providing a service that cannot be done from home. Thank you!

If you have a friend, co-worker, family member, neighbor, or you know someone who is a warehouse employee and you would like to show you appreciate them by giving them a gift, we have some ideas for you. Just because we’re social distancing, doesn’t mean we can’t be there for each other. Sending a text or leaving a voicemail is probably the best way to let someone know you’re thinking of them. That person might be too busy to pick up the phone or reply to your text, but be assured that seeing a message from you will bring a smile to his or her face. The following are some gift ideas specifically for warehouse employees.

Treat a Warehouse Worker

1. ANTIBACTERIAL SUPPLIES

Workers who can’t stay at home need to be extra vigilant about keeping themselves germ-free. Anti-bacterial supplies are in short supply and warehouse workers don’t have a lot of free time to hunt these items down. When you’re picking up groceries for yourself, check to see if you can grab some of these items to give away.

• Hand wipes – Such as Wet Ones
• Surface disinfectant wipes
• Hand sanitizer
• Hand soap – Lava Heavy Duty Hand Cleaner or Dial bar soap
• Cleaning supplies
• Hand cream for over-washed hands – Gojo or Okeefe’s

2. MASKS AND GLOVES

We all know masks are impossible to buy at the moment and gloves are almost as hard to find. If you have extra disposable gloves at home and you don’t need them, consider passing them on to a warehouse worker.

• Masks – There are many tutorials for making these at home. See this Make-to-Give downloadable tracing pattern from Joanne Fabrics.
• Gloves – Clean room and lab gloves

3. WORK CLOTHING

When warehouse workers arrive at home, the first thing they do is remove their clothing and put it in the washing machine right away before they go wash their hands and face. Many employees even take their clothes off in the garage or entryway to not carry germs inside the home. There are a few ways to ease the burden of this time-consuming process. You can buy them disposable outer clothing. They could also use some extra work clothes to wear a clean set every day without having to wash daily. A drawstring dirty clothes bag would be a nice gift for stashing dirty clothes until laundry day.

• Disposable clothing – Disposable pant, disposable coveralls
• Industrial work clothing – shirts, heavyweight jeans, compression socks
• Laundry bag – Heavy duty drawstring laundry bag
• Laundry detergent packs – Tide pods

4. MEALS

These days it’s not recommended you cook and bring a meal over. However, for workers who have been on their feet all day, a hot meal or nice cup of coffee could make their day. There are many possibilities available for meal delivery and pick-up that you could give as a gift.

• Restaurant gift cards – Pizza, fast food, local restaurants. Many of these can be purchased online.
• Meal-kit subscriptions – Freshly and Home Chef have premade meal options that just need to be heated. 
• Coffee – Send ground coffee or K-cups.
• Grocery delivery – Depending on the area, you can find Instacart or other grocery delivery services.

5. ENTERTAINMENT STREAMING

Who doesn’t want to decompress after a long day of work? You can treat someone to a streaming platform membership for watching movies, shows or listening to music.

• Movies and shows – Netflix, Hulu, Disney+, Amazon Prime Video
• Cable channels – HBO, STARZ, SHOWTIME
• Music – Gift cards for iTunes or Spotify

We hope you are all staying safe during this time. Blackhawk is proud to continue to provide supplies for all our essential businesses and give support wherever we can.

For additional questions about Industrial and warehouse supplies or other sold by BlackHawk Industrial, give us a call. We’re happy to help. Our mission is to provide innovative, value-added services and products that reduce our customer’s total cost. Feel free to contact us for more information.

BlackHawk Industrial

1501 SW Expressway Drive

Broken Arrow, Oklahoma 74012

[email protected]