• Home
  • News
  • Business
  • Zalando gifts employees one week of vacation

Zalando gifts employees one week of vacation

By Simone Preuss

loading...

Scroll down to read more

Business

Online fashion retailer Zalando has come up with a special gift for its employees for the holiday season: “zacation”, or one collective week off, as a thank you for the hard work during the pandemic. 

“Covid-19. When we said goodbye to the office in March, we thought: See you in four weeks. Now, a year and a bit later we see that a pandemic is still a pandemic: It takes time,” said Carsten Keller, VP Direct to Consumer at Zalando, in a LinkedIn post.

“During this year, we have reacted, we have innovated and worked incredibly hard. And it paid off. And we can all feel it. Back-to-back video conferences at kitchen tables. Problem solving with teams during homeschooling. Being home alone for a year,” added Keller. 

“And hence we decided to take a BREAK. One week off extra in August. To breathe. To recharge. To reflect.We call it zacation. And I love it,” concluded Keller. 

Comments from colleagues at Zalando and other companies are consistently positive and range from “holiday envy” and “good move and well deserved” to “What a great initiative! Time to breathe – exactly what everyone needs right now”.

Exact details of when the extra vacation week will take place and how it will affect day-to-day operations at Zalando have not been mentioned. Logistically, this step could be a challenge for the e-tailer and it will be interesting to see how the company manages it. Should it succeed, other companies may follow suit. 

Images: Jonas Ferlin/ Pexels; Carsten Keller / Zalando

COVID 19
Zalando