HOUSTON, Texas — This week marks one month since Harris County's "Stay Home, Work Safe" orders forced restaurants to change the way they operate.
While many have adapted, others have struggled. And experts fear they won’t survive the pandemic.
Anna Tauzin, chief revenue and innovation officer for the Texas Restaurant Association, said restaurants across Houston are doing what they can to stay open as efforts to stop the spread of COVID-19 continue.
Tauzin said, “I’m afraid that we’re going to see truly a devastation of our restaurant culture because of the pandemic.”
Four weeks into a new normal, she said businesses are not doing well.
“It’s not unreasonable to think about a restaurant going under within a month,” she said. “We’ve already seen many of them have to close permanently. People have to walk away from essentially their life savings, their dream.”
She anticipates half a million people in the state’s restaurant industry will lose their jobs before the pandemic is over.
Tauzin said, “We’re looking at about a quarter of all independent restaurants in the state will not reopen after this.”
Changes like allowing customers to pick up alcohol to-go have kept sales going.
Some restaurants are finding other innovative ways to stay afloat.
Trent Patterson, director of operations at Dish Society said, “The first five or six days—when we weren’t doing the farmer’s market thing—we were down 70 percent or something like that, but we’ve seen a lot of positive improvement from sales once we starting doing the virtual farmer’s market and we really started to add on two to three new products every week.”
He said the time to take a risk is now.
Also, Patterson said customers have noticed and the payout has been worth it.
“When you see someone tip 30 percent on a produce box, eggs and milk; it really gets you up and going in the morning. Our guests have been tipping our team on their groceries,” Patterson said.
Dish Society plans to continue the virtual farmer’s market even after things return to normal.