Staff celebrate 20 Years of Big W in Nambour
Some of the original Big W staff who still work at the Nambour store are pictured with Racheal Pascoe, centre.
by Racheal Pascoe
It has already been 20 years since Big W came to town, offering locals more variety when shopping and another opportunity for employment.
When Big W opened in June 2004 it was an exciting time for our little town. I have a special interest in this store as I was a Training and Recruitment Manager for Big W at the time. Many of you will remember the recruitment drive we held at the Crushers Football Club. We had over 1300 applications from locals looking to work at the new store and it was a big job to find the best people for the roles. Over the next weeks and months, we whittled the list down and opened the store with 154 staff.
Weeks and weeks of inductions were held. Everyone endured the 6 hour, 2 part induction, covering lots of safety and Woolworths/Big W history. I met everyone during this time and still say hello to the employees who have stayed all this time.
The store was built and filled with stock but you might remember the delay on the actual opening? The store was unable to open before the tiny concrete roundabout on Howard Street was installed. We just couldn’t believe it, we couldn’t open yet. What would we do? The solution was to ship the new staff to other Big W stores to work for the time being. It took a month to get the traffic requirement sorted and then we had the green light to open for trading!
Opening day was exciting with people queueing up outside the roller doors, wanting to be the first people inside. I remember Barry Waters who was the then Queensland State Manager giving the order to put the roller doors up a few minutes early, to beat another Big W store that was opening on the same day! The command was met with a cheer – our Nambour store became the 108th Big W store nationally. Our very first customers flooded inside to check out their new Big W store.
Over the years many people have enjoyed employment at our local Big W store. It has helped lots of school-aged young people to gain experience in their first job. It has also offered a steady job to a core contingent of reliable staff who have stayed on to receive their 20 Years of Service Badge. Congratulations to everyone in the photo on being a part of the Big W story for the last 20 years. In this day and age it is a real achievement to clock up 20 years of employment with the same employer. Great job everyone!