Walmart Locations In CNY Will Start Counting Customers Again

Walmart locations in Rome, Utica, Herkimer, New Hartford, and the Syracuse area will begin counting customers in store locations due to the Coronavirus.

According to CNN, this is due to the recent spike in cases nationwide. Back in April, the company began restricting the number of people to 20% of its store capacity, or lower if mandated by local officials. For a brief period of the time, its stores stopped counting the number of customers that entered it stores.

"We know from months of metering data in our stores that the vast majority of the time our stores didn't reach our self-imposed 20% metering capacity," said Kory Lundberg, a Walmart (WMT) spokesperson. "Out of an abundance of caution, we have resumed counting the number of people entering and leaving our stores.""

Walmart locations are spreading Black Friday sales over time to limit the number of people in stores during the holiday shopping season. "Black Friday Deals for Days" will take place on weekends of November with the deals appearing online Wednesdays.

Shoppers that go to its stores instead of ordering online, or using curbside pickup, won't experience the craziness of Black Friday deals of the past. Walmart reports that they will form single-file lines at the entrances of stores and give out sanitized shopping carts.

"Health Ambassadors" will be stationed at entrances to remind people to put on their masks. Social distancing will be enforced inside with capacity controls and one-way lanes."

Walmart hopes that these changes will be safer and more manageable for both customers and their associates.