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A few items trickle in, but shoppers stay away

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Not a shopping cart or a shopper to be seen. (Lebanon Voice/Harrison Thorp photos)

ROCHESTER - Scab truck drivers crossing picket lines allowed a trickle of supplies into Market Basket stores over the past few days, but customers loyal to the store’s employees and ousted CEO stayed away, continuing the stores losses analysts have predicted in the millions of dollars every day.

Meanwhile, Chris Sturzo, the director of the Rochester Market Basket, said there’s really only one viable option: for company leaders to reinstate former CEO Arthur T. Demoulas, adding if anyone but “Artie T.” is chosen the supermarket chain’s new boss, employees will walk away from their jobs en masse.

“Anything else is not an option. No other scenario,” Sturzo said on Monday as employees nearby deep-cleaned the undersides of counters and empty shelves. “If someone else is chosen (CEO), a very significant of employees will leave.”

It's been 10 days since workers at the Market Basket headquarters in Tewksbury, Mass., walked off the job along with warehouse workers and delivery drivers.

A couple of customers meander through the Rochester Market Basket near an empty produce kiosk on Monday. 

A worker stocking shelves who did not give his name said a few trucks driven by scab workers had replenished some grocery stocks, but the produce, meat, seafood, deli and bakery shelves were nearly empty.

The only seafood item in stock were live, hard-shell lobsters selling for an attractive $4.99 a pound. They had been delivered by an outside vendor.

Sturzo, who’s worked at the Rochester store for three years and for Market Basket for 34, said he thinks it won’t be until midweek that the board makes a decision on whether to accept the offer from Artie. T.’s side.

Several other offers have also been made, said to be anywhere within the $2 billion to $4 billion range for the company's 71 stores located in New Hampshire, Massachusetts and Maine.

Sturzo said until a decision is made he’ll keep workers working doing odd jobs and projects until the company leaders actually visit the store and tell them what is going on.

“They’ll have to come down and tell us their decision,” he said. “When they tell us that, we’ll see. Most likely, he (Artie T.) buys the company."

Just outside the store, longtime customer Stephen Morley of Rochester called the other side, those aligning themselves with Arthur S. Demoulas, just “greedy and out for themselves.”

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