What Businesses Told Us About Masks

The past two weeks have been full of news related to masks. We did our best to keep people informed about what businesses are required and not required to do. You can find that summary here.

We did our research too. Following the Governor’s March 2 announcements we solicited input from business; different industries, sizes, and markets.

The large majority of businesses we spoke with told us that “nothing changes” with respect to employees and customers wearing masks at their facilities.  Business leaders still generally viewed mask wearing as a way to protect their teams, avoid downtime from illness, and keep operating through a difficult time. Others shared they wanted to lessen requirements for masks in their own business but will also respect the preference of those who wanted to wear them too.

These transitions have business in a difficult spot. Business owners want to provide a safe and welcoming environment for everyone and they do not want to alienate customers. Company owners and leaders are not expressing a desire to influence what people do outside their own facility, but they do feel a responsibility for their workforce to provide a safe working environment while continuing operations as much as possible. Most have found the right way to balance these many variables through implementing a variety of protocols.

For the time being, a few things have still not changed. Here are three:

• There is still a mask ordinance in place for Round Rock businesses.
• The advice of healthcare professionals has not changed.
• We all want businesses to thrive in Round Rock.

We are almost to the end of this painful period in our history. More vaccines are administered every day. The literal shot in the arm people get will surely give a metaphorical shot in the arm to the local business community.  Soon we can all celebrate a time when masks are only a bad memory, not the unfortunate reality.