An H&M store in New York City received flak after one of its sales executives posted a series of pictures claiming the presence of lice on the branded clothing in the store. The employee, Netroya B, also claimed that the store was taking the situation very lightly despite the complaint.
The incident took place at fashion-retailers store located in World Trade Center Oculus.
Whistle-blower Resigns From Job
In a tweet, Netroya B shared the pictures of bug infested hoodies that were being set up in the sales counter on the store. "I work at the H&M in the Oculus at World Trade & today a customer discovered lice on a rack of hoodies. They're not closing the store nor are they notifying employees of the problem. The section was just blocked off," wrote the 28-year old in her tweet on Wednesday.
The images showed a number of wingless insects crawling on the clothing. However, claiming that the store was closed following the disclosure, an H&M spokesperson told New York Post that they take customer and employee safety extremely seriously. "We take customer and employee safety extremely seriously. Out of an abundance of caution we closed the H&M store at Westfield World Trade Center in order to investigate fully," the rep said in the communique.
However, in Twitter thread, the employee revealed that she has resigned from the store and her last working day is Friday.
"Thank you to everyone concerned about me losing my job. my last day is Friday (I'm resigning because I hate it there). I apologized to my store manager because I did not expect my tweet to go up like this. I was just annoyed that it was being treated like a minor issue & it wasn't his fault. It's the company. My coworkers thanked me. This tweet is now muted. thank you to everyone who wasn't dumb and supported me. to those of you who love big companies so much, ieday," her tweet read.
Are those Lice or Bugs on the Hoodies?
The social media was divided over the type of creepy crawlies moving on the hoodies. While several believed them to be lice few others claimed it to be bugs.
"That is not lice, i fear. bed-bugs city at that H&M," tweeted a user as another wrote, "OMG ewwww that's so damn gross. Nope, the whole store has to go."
"These are adult bedbugs. Store needs to be closed immediately," read a tweet.
"Oh noooo those are bedbugs, but awful either way!! Someone prob tried on clothes and transferred them into the store. Take your work clothes off as soon as u get in your home, put them in a plastic bag to transport to a dryer immediately and run that s – – t on the highest heat," suggested another.
