Millions of Americans have lost their jobs due to COVID-19, and one working man who was forced to close his business is now simply relying on faith.
Jared Ribardi owns Infinity Solutions in Minot.
For a year now, he’s pressure washed and cleaned farm equipment, parking lots and anything you need to be cleaned, he’s done it.
Now, coronavirus has run him dry.
“It pretty much rendered my business obsolete as far as operations go. We had so many appointments lined up that it wasn’t funny, and then we just started getting call after call after call, people were telling us that obviously right now money could be used for better things,” Ribardi said.
The times have called for social distancing, self-isolation and mostly staying home. So, for companies like Ribardi’s, that all adds up to no income.
“Pray and that’s simply what I can boil it down to. As it currently sets we have no other resources really to fall back on,” Ribardi said.
Ribardi let his five employees go, which he says has a domino effect.
“Four out of the five had families. That trickles down to the kids and so on and so forth. So what in effect will happen to five people can very well affect 20 or 30 and if it wouldn’t be for my employees I couldn’t do what I do and vice versa,” he said.
Ribardi says despite being faced with tough times right now, it’s up to us to decide how we go about it from here.
“I think this has brought about a new awareness and a new awakening for people about how important life really is and how much we should really put effort into spending time with family for however long we have them here,” he said.
Ribardi has four kids and a wife and like everyone else, he’s taking it day by day.
