Covid causing issues for restaurants

COVID eating away at food industry in Pictou County

What’s it been like to be in the foodservice industry for the last two years?

“I would say it was like a car that keeps stalling,” says Greg Burrows, the owner of several Subway franchises in Pictou County, the New Glasgow Pizza Delight franchise and – until the end of the month when it closes permanently – the Goji’s frozen yogurt franchise.

With his hand in different areas of the food industry, Burrows said the impact has been mixed.

“Subway was a bit different as we were not negatively impacted due to the fact we have drive-thrus,” he said.

Pizza Delight, which provides a mix of take out and dine in, was able to pivot to more take out and delivery, but felt some of the blows of dining restrictions, lockdowns, labour shortages and most recently, the vaccine passport - something Burrows estimates has negatively impacted dine-in numbers by about 30 per cent.

Goji’s near the Pictou County Wellness Centre was the most impacted. With crowds not going to the Wellness Centre and teams not practising, business slowed dramatically.

As a result, the Pictou County franchise is closing at the end of the month. The announcement was made on the business’s Facebook page on Dec. 30.

The notice cited the ongoing restrictions that have been put in place because of COVID.

Burrows said he is also now in the process of selling Pizza Delight, which he has owned for about three years. While he said they’ve been able to grow the businesses’ market share dramatically over the last year, he said it has lost the “fun factor.”

“When the government mandated businesses to enforce their rule of vaccine passports, they forced us to segregate our customers. This took the fun out of things,” he said.

While Burrows says he’s not anti-vaccine, he believes people should have a choice.

“I love people, and it’s no fun knowing you cannot allow a large percentage of your customers into your store,” he said. “It’s not in my DNA to turn people away.”

He attributes the 30 per cent drop in dine-in sales since the mandate to the fact that both the unvaccinated and also those close to them didn’t feel comfortable eating out after the policy was implemented.

Burrows admits he struggles with it personally and hasn’t eaten inside any restaurant, including his own, since the mandate was established.

Moving forward, Burrows hopes that government is careful in what restrictions they put in place.

“For Gojis, it’s too late. It will close at the end of this month.

“Its lifeline is the Wellness Centre and with the continuous restrictions, it’s time to toss in the towel. I’m certainly no economist, but I’m sure there is going to be a point of no return for many businesses.

“Simply put, the government needs to do a complete 180 on their thought process.”

Al Muir, owner of Andre’s Pizza and Andre’s Seats in Stellarton, considers himself fortunate to have had an established pick-up and delivery side of the business started pre-COVID. Because of that, his family and employees quickly switched their emphasis to providing food to customers and keeping their business afloat.

But even with that in place, it was tough. He feels for those who had to shift completely from dine-in to offering take out at the start.

“It’s almost a new business model for them,” he said.

He believes when people couldn’t dine in, they fell back to getting take out from where they were familiar.

“I’m sure the ones that were strictly sit down had a lot harder time,” he said.

Like Burrows, Muir said he saw a major impact from the vaccine passports.

“It was almost an immediate drop when that came in,” he said.

If a group of four that usually came out to eat realized that one of the group wasn’t vaccinated, rather than three coming and one not, they all just didn’t come.

He believes the drop in dine-in traffic would be more than 30 per cent for his business.

Muir said the fact that they’re unable to operate at full capacity, even with the passport system in place, is frustrating to businesses that are trying to keep going.

Since the latest Omicron wave hit in December, they’ve also noticed that people aren’t eating out because of fear of getting it.

“It doesn’t matter that you’re allowed to be open,” he said.

“When nobody is coming in, it doesn’t make any difference.”

Perhaps hardest of all is the unknowns for the future in both the pandemic and the government’s approach.

“It's hard to plan business going forward when there’s been no word on the exit strategy,” he said.

“The uncertainty is difficult to deal with when you’re in this type of business.”

“I love people, and it’s no fun knowing you cannot allow a large percentage of your customers into your store. It’s not in my DNA to turn people away.” Greg Burrows Restaurant owner