Family Ties Pushed Her to Join Exchange
Alexandria Gazaway, second from left, joins Pacific Region Commander Col. Scott Maskery (far right), Deputy Commander Lt. Col. Brian White (far left) and her staff at the Camp Kinser Elementary School cafeteria.
One Exchange core value, “Family Serving Family,” is much more than a catchy slogan for many of the organization’s associates. More than 85 percent of the Exchange’s 33,000 associates around the world are connected to the military.
Alexandria Gazaway is no exception. She supervises the Exchange’s school feeding program at Camp Kinser’s Elementary School, but her journey to there started many years before.
Her father served in the Air Force for 24 years; her grandfather and great-grandfather also were military pilots.
“I believe having family ties to the military did affect me joining the Exchange family,” Gazaway said. “I am an Air Force ‘brat,’ and AAFES has always been around every base I have lived on.”
Enhancing quality of life
Immediate family members of troops are accustomed to having the Exchange present in their lives as a place to shop, relax and enhance their quality of life, she added.
“My parents took second jobs at the Exchange at various duty stations,” Gazaway said. “The jobs not only helped with income for school supplies and new clothes for my siblings and myself, but helped them learn different skills and make new friends.”
Her mother, who is from El Salvador, improved her English when she worked at the Kadena AB school lunch program, Gazaway said.
Like a ‘small village’
The relationship between the Exchange and customers is much like a small village where everyone knows everyone and all who are able pitch in to help the other and take pride when the community succeeds, she said.
“The most difficult challenge I have had to overcome while working with the Exchange was to stop being so introverted,” Gazaway said. “I was extremely shy as a child. Working at the Exchange, you are constantly interacting with other associates and customers, asking if anyone needs help, making small conversations, etc.
“Here at Kinser Elementary, the primary customers are students K-5 who will inform you about anything and everything from who cut the lunch line to ‘I am getting a new baby brother.’ They are the most talkative customers I have ever met.”
