If you catch Jazmin S.’s voicemail you will hear one of the most adorable young voices–her five-year-old daughter, asking you to leave a message for her mom and then about five seconds of pure, heart-warming giggling.
Jazmin is a single mom and nothing is more important to her than her children. She, her daughter and her five-month-old son live in Pilsen on the lower west side of Chicago, where Jazmin grew up. The kids’ father lives in the area, but Jazmin also relies on her large extended family to care for them. Jazmin’s grandmother, who emigrated from Mexico, has lived in the same house for over sixty years; four of her six children still live within walking distance. The other two, including Jazmin’s mom, aren’t much farther away.
“I’m very family oriented,” Jazmin says.
Like many of us, Jazmin is also answering the question of what she wants to do with her own career. She’s worked office jobs, retail jobs, as a party planner and holds both a real estate and bartending license. “I worked a lot and the pay wasn’t great,” she says. “I felt like I was taking a lot of time to be away from my kids.”
Now Jazmin works with Instacart as a Personal Shopper at the Costco just to the north of Pilsen. Being able to schedule when exactly she works allows her to both maximize income and family time. “The convenience works really well,” she says.
Jazmin first started working with Instacart in December 2013 but then took a year off to have her son. When she wanted to come back, she says Instacart welcomed her with open arms. “I really appreciated that,” she says. One of the key benefits while raising her infant has been that the flexibility allows her to continue breastfeeding. “I don’t have to put him on formula,” she says happily.
And the fact that the dynamics of her house are changing makes that flexibility even more important: her daughter just graduated from kindergarten, started playing basketball and will soon start at a summer camp focused on math and science. Jazmin realizes she’s embarking on the, let’s say, “chauffeur phase” of parenting, so being able to schedule work around her family commitments will be critical.
That flexibility has also allowed more quality time with the extended family. “It’s always someone’s birthday or a party,” she laughs. Jazmin sometimes works for a few hours, knocks off to attend a family gathering and then gets back to work.
“I never really had to check in with anybody to say I was leaving,” she says.
She’s also built a community with Instacart shoppers as well. Eight of her friends, including her best friend, work with Instacart. Often when she talks with people that are considering working with Instacart, they’re confused about how the scheduling and logistics work. So Jazmin explains how shoppers make their own schedule, how she’s now able to pay her bills with the money she earns through Instacart — and most importantly, how she’s able to maximize time with her children.
“It’s very simple,” she says.
Learn more about becoming a shopper at Instacart.
