Redundant flight attendant grateful for supermarket job

Friday, 3 July 2020

Sarah Jones’ 8-second Tiktok video about losing her airline job and then working as a supermarket warehouse shelver has more than 250,000 views.

A former Air New Zealand flight attendant says she’s grateful for her supermarket job after being made redundant by the airline.

Sarah Jones posted on social media about losing her airline job, and switching to working as a Countdown warehouse shelver handling online orders the next day.

She then shared an email from Air New Zealand chief exexcutive Greg Foran who said he hoped she would fly with the airline again soon.

”Good on you for making a difference,” he wrote. “As you may know I spent 41 years being a shop keeper and an [sic] very familiar with the role. Hope we can get you back flying again with us real soon though. We miss you.”

Air NZ chief executive Greg Foran replies to redundant flight attendant's popular Tiktok about working at supermarket.

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Jones shared the email on her Instagram page and commented: “What a good guy.”

Air New Zealand has made 4000 of its 12,500 staff redundant with further job losses possible. Other airlines, such as Virgin and Qantas, have also announced significant redundancies due to the impact of Covid-19 on travel.

Jones said she had emailed Foran before but had never met him.

“I think he seems really cool, really focused on his company and the team, it’s cool that you can reach out to the CEO of a company and he’ll happily respond. I think people would usually be scared to speak to someone so far up the chain from them, but he’s really approachable.”

On Instagram, Jones said after working for Air New Zealand for five years, facing the redundancy was “heavy”.

“Do you know what it feels like to lose your job over something that you didn’t do. I don’t know how to explain it but it’s pretty lame. Just because I’ve been carrying it well, doesn’t mean it’s not heavy. I’ve watched it fall apart around me for the last three months.”

Air New Zealand has been approached for comment.

Jones said she got the Countdown job within a week of applying for it at the end of lockdown level 4 and had been working with her former airline peers.

“I decided to work at Countdown because I knew it was going to be somewhere that needed lots of help during lockdown. Plus it was the only place that was actively hiring,” Jones said.

“There’s quite a few here who had airport jobs and [Countdown] are very happy to have us.

Her Tiktok has more than 250,000 views since it was posted on Wednesday.

Jones said she did not expect her video to become popular but said there had been an overwhelmingly positive response, with many viewers sharing their support and best wishes.

“I joined Air New Zealand five years ago because I wanted to see other parts of the world but I also wanted to share New Zealand with tourists. People always ask on the plane where to visit and what to see and it’s cool to share a part in that.

Everyone’s been super supportive and lots of people have shared that they’ve lost their job on my video too,” she said.

Jones said while she hadn’t received any job offers, yet she was happy to have a job during the global pandemic.

She didn’t know whether she would return to her former career, but she hoped the popularity of her video would not jeopardise future opportunities.