Laid-off communications executive used $17 garden center job as bridge to new role

Leslie Friday, a 48-year-old communications professional, took a $17-an-hour job at a Massachusetts garden center after a June 2025 layoff left her short of cash, she wrote for CNBC Make It. The part-time role paid slightly above the state’s $15 minimum wage and helped her meet some bills while she continued applying for full-time marketing and communications positions.

Friday said she had been a senior director of content before her employer cut dozens of jobs across the organization. By January, her unemployment benefits had ended, her severance was nearly exhausted, and household expenses continued, prompting her to seek part-time work while continuing her professional job search.

She told CNBC Make It she was upfront with the garden center’s hiring managers about her circumstances and her continued search for permanent work in her field. The managers added her to the team, giving her shifts that fit around her responsibilities as a single mother of three school-age children.

A low-wage job with broader value

For roughly two months, Friday worked nearly nine hours a day on multiple days each week, often outdoors and in varied weather. Her duties included watering flowers, unloading trucks, arranging inventory and answering customer questions about plants, herbs and vegetables.

The work did not replace her previous income. Friday said the paychecks were modest and could not cover all expenses, requiring her to keep drawing on savings. Still, she said the wages helped her decide which bills she could pay and gave her a sense of control at a financially strained point.

The job also changed the daily experience of unemployment, according to her account. Instead of spending long stretches online applying for roles, networking and waiting for responses, she had a fixed schedule, physical tasks and regular contact with customers and co-workers.

Friday wrote that the setting mattered. After a long New England winter, working around plants and wildlife helped reset her mood. She said many customers arrived cheerful at the start of spring and left with flowers she had helped them choose.

Workplace structure after a layoff

Friday said losing her previous job had affected both her finances and her sense of identity. She described the layoff as especially painful because she had considered the organization a close professional community.

The garden center offered a different form of structure. Friday said her new co-workers shared her interest in plants, gardening and wildlife, and that she began forming friendships, recognizing regular customers and interacting with customers’ dogs.

She also credited the garden center’s managers with accommodating her parenting schedule. According to Friday, they gave her as many hours as her co-parenting arrangement allowed and remembered when she needed to leave early for school pickup.

While working at the garden center, Friday continued interviewing for full-time roles and scheduled interviews on days off. She said she received a job offer on the 365th day after her layoff.

Friday is now director of communications at The Max Foundation, a global health nonprofit that supports access to medication, diagnostics and services for people with cancer and rare illnesses in more than 80 low- and middle-income countries, according to her CNBC Make It bio. One month into the new role, she said she is financially stable again and continues to work at the garden center on Sundays when she can.

This story draws on original reporting from CNBC.