By Tony Huppert, CEO, Team Oil Inc.

Management of convenience stores has a tendency to forget about the Stress Factor associated with employee’s job stress, especially the clerks on the front line.

The clerks are the ones that customers will accuse of placing the gas dispensers on the wrong side of the customer’s car, making the customer have to stretch the gas hose over the car to put gas in.  Or, the customer accuses the clerk of being part of the NSA, because the credit card acceptor asks the customer for their zip code.

These are just a couple of the stressful positions the clerks are subject to everyday. Situations the clerks have to handle calmly and professionally.

Eric Huppert, president of Team Oil Inc, decided his employees needed a much needed stress relief area to eliminate the Stress Factor.

Thanks to Eric’s dedication to his employees, the Team Oil Travel Center in Spring Valley Wis., now has its own gym, complete with equipment, restroom, big screen TV, air conditioning and in floor heat, all for the employees, to work off their frustrations, with out verbally offending anybody.

The clerks are on the front line of communications with the customers. The better they are at defusing a situation the lower the Stress Factor is for management.

Tony Huppert is a Wisconsin businessman of 40 years and CEO of Team Oil Inc., the family-owned and operated Team Oil Travel Center, and Subway in Spring Valley, Wis.