Jamaican, Romanian foreign students fill employee void at Anderson’s Market

Jorene, Dejie-ann, and Joycelyn are all smiles in their Anderson’s t-shirts.

By Jacob and Norm Wheeler
Sun editors

Meet Jorene Williams, Dejie-ann Smith, and Joycelyn Mclean, college students from Jamaica who are summering near the Sleeping Bear Dunes while they work the checkout registers at Anderson’s Market and Compass Rose Bakery. All graduated from Shortwood Teacher’s College in Kingston in May with four-year Bachelor of Education degrees in Modern Languages.

“We wanted to stick together after graduation,” said Jorene. “Coming to Glen Arbor was our only opportunity to do that.”

They are here through an agency that Anderson’s Market contacted early in 2017 to bring students to the United States to work summer jobs on J1 student visas. Anderson’s Market owner Brad Anderson also brought three young men from Romania to Glen Arbor to work in the deli between mid-June and the shoulder season of late-September. The six foreign students live in the hotel behind Compass Rose Bakery at the Glen Lake Narrows. Anderson leant them bicycles which they use as their primary mode of transportation to get to downtown Glen Arbor.

“Every year the shortage of workers has become more and more pronounced,” said Anderson. “As our business has evolved, our labor requirements have grown. But the labor pool here has shrunk over the last several years. A lot of local kids want to work in restaurants because there are fewer hours and more tips. Every generation seems to have more outside activities, such as camps, internships and school activities.”

“It became difficult to have enough employees to satisfy the demand during the high tourism season. After last summer, which was grueling to match demand, we made it a goal to bring in some foreign workers.”

The six Jamaicans and Romanians represent 12.5 percent of Anderson’s total summer workforce of 48 employees. Next year, he hopes to bring as many as 12 foreign students on J1 visas, which would represent a quarter of his base.

“They would be the backbone of our high-season workforce,” said Anderson, who said the students exceeded his expectations for their work ethic, their language skills and their positive attitudes. They worked 7-8-hour shifts, 5-6 days each week, and never called in sick. The incentive to work hard was great, he added. Williams, Smith and Mclean were able to make 5-6 times per day what they’d earn in Jamaica.

Provided that a business owner in Glen Arbor can locate or provide housing (no easy task in this high rent summer economy) the J1 student visa program represents a win-win for employer and employee alike. The program requires no up-front cost for the employer; the student pays the fee and their own travel cost. In Brad Anderson’s case, he pays salary and part of their housing cost (he charged each worker $50 a week for housing, and supplemented the rest).

“I think this would (work for other Glen Arbor business owners),” said Anderson. “I think it’s kind of the template moving forward.”

After the high-tourism season ends on Labor Day weekend, Williams, Smith and Mclean will each travel to a different place in France to teach English and to polish their French.

“We studied both Spanish and French in school,” says Dejie-ann, “so we’ll be in France for 6 months teaching and learning,”

“Then we can look for jobs or return to France in September 2018,” Joycelyn adds.

The three work split shifts at Compass Rose, then put on their Anderson’s t-shirts to work five days a week from 3–close, usually around 11 or 12 p.m.

What are the differences they notice up here?

“The weather is a lot colder here, and the light lasts longer,” said Jorene.

“We went to the Cherry Festival, went on a host of exciting rides, and ate both ice cream and cheesy fries,” said Dejie-ann. “We had never before seen Pharaoh, the ride with singing boats.”

“The customer interactions are different here,” said Joycelyn. “If we don’t understand what a customer says we’d never say ‘What!’ We were taught to say ‘Pardon me’ or ‘Excuse me’. So we were cultured differently.”

“People from the United States are always happy,” Tony Ancuta, a 19-year-old Orthodox Theology student from Iasi, Romania, chimed in from the deli. “They always smile at you. They don’t get angry from little things.”

It took the Jamaicans a couple of days to get here on May 26. Flights were delayed in Kingston and Ft. Lauderdale, and then their ride from Detroit had to go through Chicago to pick up somebody else. But they’re happy to be here and they are working really hard.

If you see Jorene, Dejie-ann, or Joycelyn before they depart after Labor Day, please say hey and make them feel welcome. Tony and the Romanians will be in the deli until late September.