Meet the Melbourne homewares company offering vaccinated staff $100 Myer vouchers

A Melbourne-based homewares supplier that employs 90 people across the country is giving away $100 Myer vouchers to staff if they get the coronavirus vaccine.

The owner of HAG Import, which distributes tableware brands including Maxwell & Williams and Casa Domani, sent an email to his staff on Tuesday, offering them vouchers if they have receive both doses of the vaccine.

In an email addressed to “everyone in the HAG family” Max Grundmann said the lockdown in Victoria prompted him to think about how he could help.

“I have decided to encourage every one of our HAG family to get the jab right now as quickly as you all possibly can by rewarding you with a $100 Myer Gift Voucher as soon as you provide proof of your double vaccination,” he wrote.

He also invited staff who had already received two doses of the vaccine to contact him to arrange a gift voucher.

Speaking to SmartCompany, Grundmann says he set up the initiative because he believes he has a responsibility to improve the safety of his staff and community.

“I really felt that we have responsibility that as Victorians, Australians and as business people, to improve the conditions of our communities,” he says.

Grundmann says he was also motivated to act because “politicians are not fulfilling their obligations in ensuring people’s lives and livelihoods are protected” from the coronavirus pandemic.

“The best illustration of that is the recent lockdown, again in Victoria, which is a disgrace,” he adds.

HAG Import employs 90 people across the country, and they are all are able to receive the $100 vouchers, which could cost the business up to $9,000.

Along with Maxwell & Williams and Casa Domani tableware brands, HAG distributes Krosno glassware and KitchenAid appliances to retail outlets around the country, including Myer.

“This initiative is so important and so beneficial that it should not be seen not as a cost, it should be seen as an enormous investment in our lives and our livelihood,” Grundmann says.

“Whatever you can do is better than doing nothing.”