Phase 2 precautions went into effect on March 17.
Earlier today, we started implementing the following precautions at Blueprint Coffee in hopes of minimizing the impact of COVID-19. This effort, encouraged by many of our peers in the industry and the guidance of the WHO, aims to prevent the need for moving a more drastic phase within St. Louis. We know drinking coffee out of disposable cups isn’t the best way to enjoy it. We wish precautions like this weren’t necessary. But, we can all be practitioners of proactive public health. Doing so may be what prevents us and those we love form suffering the effects of the virus.
Please keep local businesses in mind during this time of economic slowdown. If you possess the means, we encourage supporting your regular spots by purchasing gift cards to help support their cash flow during this challenging time. We understand that many people will be avoiding public places during this time. Remember we can deliver coffee to you every week with our subscriptions and our instant coffee is a great thing to have on hand so you can have great coffee in almost any place or location that has water.
BLUEPRINT COFFEE COFFEE BAR PRECAUTIONS
- All food and beverages will be served in to-go disposable containers.
- Staff will wash their hands for at least 20 seconds at the start of each shift and at the top of every hour.
- Any staff to cough or sneeze into their hand, a sleeve, their shirt, or a towel or touch their face will stop work and wash hands before returning to work.
- All tables and counters will be sprayed with sanitizer, which will be allowed to sit on the surface for 30 seconds before being wiped up with disposable paper towels, every hour at the half hour (xx:30)
- All condiments, lids, and cups will be kept behind the counter. Employees will offer to help with any cream or sugar. A sign will be posted about this at the normal condiment station.
- Hand sanitizer will be placed at the register for customer and staff use. Employees should use it after handling cash or credit cards, wear gloves and change them after touching cash/credit card.
- Cash transactions will be discouraged and chip or contactless payment encouraged.
- In addition, customers will not be allowed to touch the register. Tipping will he asked for verbally.
- Bathrooms will be cleaned and sprayed heavily with sanitizer every 2 hours on the first quarter hour (xx:15)
- Trashed will be emptied on the alternating first quarter hour (xx:15)
- Staff shall wear gloves while emptying trash and cleaning restrooms. After completing, staff will wash hands.
- Hand-to-hand contact among staff and patrons or other staff is discouraged.
- Employee drinks and food will not be allowed to be consumed or stored anywhere except café dining areas or designated employee consumption areas. Food brought from home can be stored in the fridge until ready to be consumed, but eating and drinking should be done out of the preparation area in the same areas we will be cleaning hourly.
- Each store is encouraged to allocate an employee drink area where drinks in disposable and covered cup can be stored. This should be cleaned along with all other surface at the top of each hour.
BLUEPRINT COFFEE PRODUCTION PRECAUTIONS
- The production counter, bag sealer, and scale should be sprayed with sanitizer between each batch.
- The roasting controls and laptop should be wiped down every hour.
- Production team members shall follow the hand washing and food/bev policy of the rest of the team.
- On deliveries, employees will simply ask the name of the receiving party and write it on the invoice instead of asking for a signature.
EMPLOYEE HEALTH
- any employee with a fever above 99.6F will be required to stay home from work until they are fever free without the use of a fever reducer for 24 hours.
- Employees with a cough, shortness of breath, runny noise, or congestion are asked to stay home until symptoms subside.
- We have allocated a sum of money to a paid-time-off pool for those members of our staff who need to stay home because of illness and miss scheduled hours. If this amount is exhausted, we will explore alternative funding.
- We will continue to monitor the situation in St. Louis and if the situations worsen, we will enact more drastic precautions