Coronavirus: Texas couple hires mariachi band to play inside store to ease tensions

A Texas couple hired a mariachi band to help ease tensions at a local grocery store.

A Texas couple hired a mariachi band to help ease tensions at a local grocery store.

Going to the store has been particularly hectic since the coronavirus outbreak. As customers search frantically to stock up on paper goods and hand sanitizers, tensions have mounted.

A south Texas couple, however, is working to ease the strain, hiring a mariachi band to play at a local store. Emmanuel Mallen, and his wife Maira Mallen, are hoping music can soothe the savage shoppers.

"I woke up to my feed full of coronavirus stuff. I just felt it would be an uplift at our local H-E-B," Emmanuel Mallen told KTRK. "It has been so tense lately. When they started playing, the mood (changed) immediately."

Customer Ashley Lyons shared a video on Facebook showing the band playing around 11:30 a.m in the store, located in Schertz.

“So, we are going down the same way the Titanic did, just in the San Antonio way,” Lyons posted on Facebook. “Thanks to Emmanuel Mallen for bringing the fun in!”

Despite Gov. Greg Abbott’s assurances that there was no need to panic, products continue to fly off the shelves.

“There is absolutely no need to go out and stockpile supplies,” Abbott said Friday after declaring a statewide emergency. “This isn’t the type of situation like where we see with an oncoming hurricane.”

Perhaps so. The customers continue to stream into stores. At least in one store, they will be serenaded by a soothing band.

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