PNA file photo
MANILA – Home improvement and construction supply retailer, Wilcon Depot Inc., said over three-fourths of its employees are now willing to be vaccinated, especially with the expected arrival of its procured vaccines against the coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) next month.
“Our company really supports the government’s call urging everyone to get vaccinated… Seventy-six percent of our employees signified interest in the vaccine so they want to be vaccinated and above 1 percent of our employees have been fully vaccinated already,” Rosemarie Bosch Ong, Wilcon Depot senior executive vice president and chief operating officer, said in a virtual press briefing on Monday.
Ong attributed the huge number of employees willing to be inoculated to the company’s successful information campaign on the importance of achieving population protection.
She said 50,000 doses of AstraZeneca vaccines they procured are expected to arrive by the third week of July, a portion of which the company intends to donate to the local government units (LGUs) especially in areas where its branches are located.
“We are ready already, we are starting to plan out everything, the site, how to do it, and then we have to coordinate with the LGU because we need the LGU to approve the vaccination site that we are going to set up and of course the logistics and everything,” she added.
Ong said the company has tapped a logistics company that will handle the transfer of the vaccines.
“Yes, we are hopeful that we can have a seamless, we can have a more organized (vaccine) rollout so that we can achieve population protection for Wilcon employees plus of course the relatives of our employees, their extended families, and also our partner suppliers whoever wants to avail of that 50,000 vaccines,” she said.
Ong said the company will continue conducting a vaccine information campaign to encourage its remaining 24 percent of its employees to get inoculated as it provides incentives to them.
Meanwhile, the company is spending PHP3.5 billion this year to establish nine more stores in line with a target to hit 100 stores before 2025.
It ended 2020 with 63 stores.
Ong said they aim to hire 90 workers for a new store. (PNA)
