In 2020, the year of the Communist Chinese virus (COVID-19) outbreak, many industries were hit hard because of California’s outbreak policies, like California’s theme parks, which have not had a chance to reopen since they closed in March. The restaurant industry is also one of the hard-hit industries, facing all kinds of strict regulations, closures, reopening with restrictions, outdoor dining and being severely restricted again, it’s really not easy for restaurants to survive and stay in business after a year.
The following is a confusing and heartfelt account from a restaurant owner, which shows the double standard that the government has been applying to restrict restaurants and make them a “target” when the situation changes.
As I entered the grocery store at the same time as about 30 other people, I couldn’t help but think of my restaurant, which was only allowed to have parties of six people total and had to make reservations in 10-minute intervals to ensure that people attending different parties didn’t arrive at the same time.
As I was pushing the cart around the store, I thought about my restaurant, which so far has invested thousands of dollars in printing disposable menus to make sure everyone uses the new menu that no one ever uses.
As I was in the produce area with about 15-20 people around me, I was reminded of the strict policy in the restaurant, “People are not allowed to mingle and walk around the room except to use the restroom and enter and exit the restaurant; tables must be kept 6 feet apart from each other, which has cut our guests in half.”
As I watched the lady next to me pick up apples with her hands, double check them and then put them back on the pile until she had picked out a satisfactory one; others would do the same that day and would eventually put them in their mouths and eat them, I thought about my restaurant’s sanitation requirements, the use of separate utensils, dishes, and glassware for each guest, and the rules for every object surface that each guest could touch (tables, chairs, salt and pepper shakers, etc.).
When I saw a man walking back and forth picking out goods ignoring or not paying attention to the direction of the arrows on the floor, I thought of my restaurant and the constant reminders and guidance my staff gives to guests by locking a door, blocking or prohibiting certain areas, and what my team does to prohibit guests from walking where they are not allowed to walk.
As I held the handle-only cart, I thought about my restaurant, which has invested thousands of dollars (so far) in printing disposable menus on ink and paper to ensure that no two guests touch the same menu.
In the area where cereal is sold, I saw a man on the phone who had his mouthpiece removed and I thought of my restaurant where the mouthpiece policy is costing me a lot of business.
At the checkout counter, I saw the terminal covered with plastic wrap and I paid with my debit card, but no one sanitized it after the person before me used it. It occurred to me that at my restaurant, we sanitize the debit card terminal with a sanitizer after each guest uses it each time.
As I stood at the crowded exit trying to leave, I thought about my restaurant’s tracking system where we keep track of the guest’s name, phone number, table number, arrival and departure times, waiter, and the area where the guest was seated, all of which are recorded in great detail at my restaurant, but here (the grocery store) doesn’t need to collect a single piece of information from the guest.
As I sat in my car after shopping and watched so many people leave the store, I wondered if someone could have contracted COVID-19 in the grocery store and then went to the restaurant afterwards, and I really wondered why restaurants were being blamed as the source of spreading the disease.
Restaurants have been identified as the “source” of COVID-19 infections (although no official announcement has been made about an outbreak at a restaurant), but we are the only industry that has been asked to provide contact information for tracking.
Someone with the virus could have gone to a Costco, Home Depot, Walmart, a food court in a shopping center, or any supermarket, and then traced it back to the restaurant that provided the people’s details, and the restaurant took responsibility and forced the restaurant to close. If it is an employee of a supermarket who is infected, he or she is usually sent home to self-quarantine without closing the big supermarket.
Do you really want to blame the restaurants that have invested thousands of dollars and are enforcing stricter policies than anywhere else? Could it be that the virus is spreading from restaurants, and why are they the first targets to be shut down every time?
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