Costco is paying to keep its sample servers employed as store cleaners after the service was suspended amid coronavirus concerns

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Many Costco stores have stopped serving free samples.

• Costco recently pulled free food samples from many of its stores across the globe as a hygiene measure.
• The people who used to serve samples in their stores have recently shifted to cleaning and sanitizing carts and shelves.
• A third-party company, Club Demonstration Services (CDS), handles Costco's product demonstrations in certain countries and is responsible for paying these employees.
• A representative from Costco said the warehouse chain is paying CDS to keep paying the workers as they continue to do other jobs for Costco.
• Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

Costco stopped giving out free food samples at some of its stores around the world as a hygiene precaution amid the coronavirus outbreak.

Now, many of the employees who used to serve samples have shifted to cleaning the stores and sanitizing carts and shelves, a Costco spokesperson confirmed.

A third-party company, Club Demonstration Services (CDS), handles Costco's product demonstrations in certain countries. About 30,000 CDS employees are employed at Costco stores around the world, 70% of which are in the US, a Costco representative confirmed. Under normal circumstances, Costco sample servers get paid by CDS to present and hand out samples of different products.

The Costco representative confirmed that the company wanted to be able to keep these workers employed while also having them work jobs that would benefit the company during the coronavirus outbreak, which has brought heightened store traffic.

This representative confirmed that the warehouse chain is paying CDS to keep paying the workers as they continue to do other jobs for Costco.

Five employees at Costco warehouses in Utah, Texas, Illinois, and on the East Coast told Business Insider that the sample servers in their stores are now doing tasks related to the cleaning and sanitizing of the store. These employees were granted anonymity in order to speak frankly about the conditions at Costco.

One employee in a warehouse in the Northeast told Business Insider that the CDS employees in his store are mostly elderly people, which means they are at a higher risk during the coronavirus outbreak. A Costco representative could not confirm the age demographics of the CDS employees.

"I feel really bad for them because they are an older population which is now an at-risk population," another employee at an East Coast Costco said about the CDS employees in her store, who she said are now doing tasks like wiping down surfaces and helping people at checkout.

"I think we're all concerned about [getting infected]," an elderly CDS employee at a Utah warehouse told Business Insider, explaining how seeing people walk around in face masks can be frightening while on the job.

This employee said she was grateful to have been able to maintain a job at Costco while her sample serving job is on hold. She added that her hours have been reduced, but she still gets her paycheck from CDS.

CDS did not return Business Insider's request for comment.

Costco is currently experiencing a major surge in sales as shoppers flock to the warehouse stores to stock up amid coronavirus fears. The company has already announced restrictions on purchases and returns to curb the practice of overbuying that is leaving some shelves bare of essential products like toilet paper and soap.

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