If today’s trek into work caused an especially severe case of the Mondays, be thankful work wasn’t at the Trader Joe’s in Westfield, New Jersey, because it no longer has a roof. Snowzilla buried this particular swath of Jersey, about 45 minutes west of New York, under 24 inches this weekend, but it only took a foot or so of snowfall before the flat rooftop of this Trader Joe’s location gave up. Local firefighters arrived on the scene after neighbors noticed the walls were cracking, and an NBC New York reporter showed up shortly thereafter, just in time to yell as the concrete walls started, in his words, “bulging out”:
The fire department says three of the walls buckled in total, and several AC units dropped through into the store below. (“It’s in bad shape,” the director of public works said.) Wisely, this Trader Joe’s decided to close early on Saturday, so thankfully nobody was on the premises when the collapse occurred. City officials figure the whole building will have to be razed, and the area all around the store has been closed until damages can be fully assessed.
For now, Trader Joe’s is working to find spots at nearby stores for the 160 employees. Westfield’s loyal shoppers, fearing for the future of Speculoos Cookie Butter, are begging the grocery chain on Facebook to think hard before relocating, though any lingering questions about whether the store needs to be condemned are answered by a quick glance at its now-catawampus front door:
