Safety Warehouse turns unsafe

2020 is no longer our problem, but the associated infection and quarantines will remain so for a while. But we can't say goodbye to it without inducting one last person, place, or thing into the Sick Phoque Club, and that's where December 2020's new initiate, the Safety Warehouse, comes in. People who flocked to Auckland’s Aotea Square on the 5th in hope of some free cash have been left angry, out of pocket, and injured. The event, by The Safety Warehouse, was marketed as “New Zealand’s first ever mass cash drop”, with the promise of “actual money” flying from the sky to the tune of $100,000. But that wasn't money. It was vouchers that looked like $5 notes. People turned up in their hundreds after securing free tickets, but when the cash started raining down and people realised fake money was coming down, things got “really, really ugly”, Green MP Ricardo Menéndez said. He stumbled on the event by chance, and said it got “pretty violent” after the crowd realised what was happening.

And New Zealand's first ever Latin American MP wasn't the only detractor. Wayne Lynch drove up from Palmerston North, hoping the $120 he spent on petrol would be more than compensated by the cash giveaway. He realised that wasn’t the case when he caught his first two notes and spotted they were fake. Instead of legal tender, the “cash” gives the bearer 30 per cent off orders from The Safety Warehouse, which sells PPE online. Lynch said he was left stranded in Auckland with no money to get back home. He was also hurt in the crush of the crowd. “I was stomped on, when they were throwing the money I had a whole pile of people on top of me.” So what brought him up to Auckland for the cash drop, I hear you ask? Without the money, his infant son Elijah could go blind - he has congenital cataracts, and he needs two surgeries in Wellington to remove them. The operations themselves are funded (read: THIS IS NEW ZEALAND NOT AMERICA), but Lynch, who comes from Palmerston North, still needs to pay for accommodation, aftercare, and medication. "We didn't know whether we'd be able to get back to Palmerston North or back to Wanganui to pick up our kids. So we were stressing about that and then the whole stress with the surgery as well."

"The vouchers that were also presented at the event were in addition to the cash that was given away. We never could have expected the inclusion of the vouchers would have created such hostility and a misunderstood narrative," the company said in a statement. I call bullshit. They knew full well what they were doing. And they also need to reimburse a pub in Hamilton that inadvertently received four of the vouchers as payment for drinks.