Businesses ranging from office supplies retailers to childcare providers have cited major employers’ push to get workers back to offices as a tailwind during third-quarter earnings calls, or at least a reason to be hopeful.
“I thought after Labor Day, we would get a quick read on what the story was going to be about work-from-home versus work in return to office,” said Brian Harris, CEO of Ladder Capital Corporation, a real estate investment trust, on the company’s earnings call. New York is “winning” in the move back to the workplace, he said.
But even some restaurant operators are upbeat. “I spent last Friday going around to a bunch of Shacks and just trying to think about and understand kind of what is Friday going to look like in cities,” said Shake Shack CEO Randy Garutti. “And I was pretty encouraged about what I saw, even in Midtown Manhattan on that day.”
Though it is not all sunshine: The company’s recovery would have been even more robust if return-to-office trends were stronger, according to CFO Katie Fogertey. While the trends were encouraging, she said, “we’re still on the road to recovery”.