Standing in front of the 150-year-old Trinity Church, employees and advocates echoed this sentiment. Some of their signs even read, “A Cage Is Not A Home To Love.”
“I’ve had this job for seven years, I started straight out of college. It was my first job. This is the first time that I felt like I needed to hit the streets to make sure that I was proud of my company. That I was happy to work for them and we’re adhering to those Wayfair values, like — everyone deserves a home that they love!” Madeline Howard, a Wayfair product engineer who helped organize the demonstration Wednesday, told Refinery29.
For the employee organizers and supporters in the middle of the mix, doing call-and-response shouts for justice, there seemed to be a sense of righteous anger. For the anonymous staffers who stood around the perimeter, there seemed to be feelings of deep disappointment and despair. While there was talk of moving in the “right direction,” there was a feeling overall of hearts broken as a result of putting profit over people — over children.
The company’s brass seem to be following the direction of other tech companies by distancing themselves from anything other than providing a service, and claiming that not providing said service to everyone is somehow discriminatory. It remains to be seen if this tactic, which seems at best naive in our current political landscape, and at worst, predatory, will pay off for Wayfair in the long term.