Summer hours are a perk small businesses can offer workers to boost morale

NEW YORK (AP) — With summer off to a scorching start, workers across the country may be dreaming of a beach getaway or heading out early to watch a movie in an air-conditioned theater.

For some, that may be a reality. Business owners have found that offering summer hours — a reduced schedule on Fridays, typically between Memorial Day and Labor Day — can be a way to boost employee morale. Workers are able to cope with child care interruptions during the summer, return to the office refreshed and feeling valued in their work, owners say.

Reduced hours during the summer months can also help small businesses stand out to potential employees in a competitive talent market.

“When smaller employers have fewer resources and want to be more competitive in attracting and retaining quality talent, they want to be creative with the benefits they offer. And one of the benefits they can offer would be flexible summer hours,” said Rue Dooley, knowledge advisor at the Society for Human Resources Management.

However, special summer hours are not suitable for all types of industries. And it takes some trial and error to find the best option for each business.

Michael Wieder, co-founder of Lalo, which makes baby and toddler products, thought the summer schedule suited his 32 employees because so many of them — about 75 percent — are parents.

Its employees work remotely and are located across the United States and several other countries. Since the company was founded in 2019, he has tried various summer schedule programs, such as offering every other Friday off, but the current system works best, he said. On Fridays, the business closes at 1 p.m. local time. Employees also get four-day weekends for Memorial Day, Labor Day and July 4th.

“We know that child care is more difficult during the summer,” he said. “Summer is a time when people like to spend time with their families or go on trips, and we want to be able to reward our employees with extra time with their families.”

Greg Hakim, owner of Corporate Ink in Boston, which provides public relations services to emerging technology companies, said he uses summer hours as a recruiting and retention tool. He highlights summer hours in job descriptions and said the benefit has helped him retain his staff — especially during the pandemic, when others struggled to keep workers.

“It just helped us retain our team during the ‘Great Resignation,’ people were losing people left and right,” he said. “And I think we went 23 months without any employees quitting. That’s a huge advantage and a huge competitive advantage.”

Jim Christy is co-owner of Midwest Cards, a Columbus, Ohio-based trading card retailer with about 30 employees. He started offering summer hours — Fridays off after 2 p.m. — in 2021, a year after he started the business, as the pandemic upended normal work practices.

The hardest part was figuring out what to offer his brick-and-mortar store employees, who also fulfill online orders, since they had to work regular hours to keep the store running. He decided to give his logistics employees Friday afternoons off, while the six employees who work the physical side and handle customer service for online orders get Monday off, when the store is closed. Some employees can log in remotely to answer customer questions if they want, but it’s not required.

“We couldn’t apply one situation to everyone. So it was a bit complicated,” he said.

For some companies, summer hours work so well that they even go further. Chris Langer, co-founder of digital marketing agency CMYK, has 14 employees who all usually work in the company’s studio.

In 2014, instead of offering Friday afternoons off, it began offering entire Fridays off during the summer, or every other week. Then last year, Langer started hearing about the four-day work week, so he decided to try that option over the summer.

Communicating with the company’s close-knit staff, who have worked together for years, makes the four-day week feasible, Langer said.

“We’re a small company, so it’s easy to have a discussion with everyone about what’s real and how everyone is feeling, whether they’re feeling stressed, whether they can do their job,” he said.

If a big project is planned, he might call people on a Friday, but so far that has only happened twice since CMYK instituted the four-day week.

“It’s more stressful in terms of the work you have to do throughout the week, but the day (off) was much more rewarding,” he said.

Of course, summer hours don’t work for every business. Retail stores may lose customers to big box stores or other stores that are open longer. And employees who are paid hourly rather than a fixed salary may balk at being paid for fewer hours.

Jennifer Johnson, owner of True Fashionistas, a consignment store in Naples, Florida, thought she would try summer hours in 2022 because Naples is seasonal, with the busiest part of the year ending around Easter. Starting May 1, she changed her hours from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. to 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. But the change didn’t work.

“We have 45 to 50 employees, and this has reduced their hours, which has upset them, and rightly so,” she said. “It’s also upset our customers who were used to our hours and wanted to shop.”

She gave up her efforts after two months and did not try again.

“I really believe that consistency is the key to everything,” she said. Customers need to know they can count on you to stay open. You can’t always change your hours, because that’s a quick way to lose customers. »

Mae Anderson, Associated Press