Jeff Blydenburgh’s office attire: a gray pinstriped suit, dark tie, polished shoes and an “I need a job” placard.
His office?
In the morning it’s Sixth Street by the Interstate 94 exit ramp in St. Paul. In the afternoon it’s the Seventh Place Mall. By early evening he’s standing at Seventh and Kellogg, near the Xcel Energy Center and the mass of commuters leaving downtown.
Blydenburgh, 59, lost his six-figure job as vice president of an auto parts company in December and has been out of work since, he said. He’s sent out more than 300 resumes, applied for $10-an-hour jobs at area malls and daily trolls job sites like Monster and CareerBuilder. He’s had one interview.
A couple of weeks ago the Lowertown resident reached his breaking point.
He remembered seeing a documentary about the Great Depression, where businessmen carried signs that said they were looking for work.
“I’m not too proud to do that,” he thought.
So he picked up a large signboard and a marker and went to work.
“I need a job,” he wrote. He noted that he was ex-middle management, but would “take anything.”
Then he hit the streets of downtown St. Paul.
“Maybe if you’re standing right out there, you can basically sell them on yourself as far as your background,” he said.
On Tuesday, he’d already lined up one job interview and had pocketed a couple of business cards from the lunchtime crowd on the Seventh Place Mall.
“The older generation, they’ll stop and tell me, ‘Good luck,'” Blydenburgh said.
Still, there are folks who won’t make eye contact or shuffle by uncomfortably. Blydenburgh said it’s a small price to pay.
“Mentally, it feels good to be out here and feel like a part of the workforce,” he said.
He’s not in dire straits — he was able to get an extension on his unemployment benefits, he said, and his wife has a job with the state.
But he wants to work.
“When you haven’t been unemployed since 1969, it’s culture shock,” he said. “I never sat back and said I have to make $125,000 a year. I just need a job.”
One unexpected outcome of his sign slinging is that some passersby, seeing his suit and the word “work,” assume he’s hiring.
“That happened to me at least five times today,” he said. He just tells them that he’s looking for work, too.
He said that with unemployment extensions ending for thousands soon, there would be more people “thinking outside the box” looking for work.
“We’re going to see more of this,” he said.
John Brewer can be reached at 651-228-2093.
