Coronavirus and Empty Restaurants

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reymann
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Re: Coronavirus and Empty Restaurants

Post by reymann »

i expect a lot of buffet restaurants to follow sweet tomatoes lead and close permanently. hometown buffet might be the next likely candidate to close it doors for good since they were struggling as it is pre-covid. sizzler may survive without the salad bar and could spread tables further out to replace the salad bar spaces.
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Re: Coronavirus and Empty Restaurants

Post by cjd »

storewanderer wrote: May 7th, 2020, 5:54 pm Here in Nevada we are reopening most retail and also restaurants on Saturday, it was announced today.

Restaurants will be at 50% capacity. That is worse than Texas with a 25% capacity requirement. Wow.

It is funny as previously the governor said he would not even consider reopening until 14 days of declines in active cases took place, which has not happened yet.

I guess the state needs money bad and is desperate. New cases in Reno area have been on the rise this week, especially earlier this week.

Will be interesting to see how case counts go the next few weeks.
Here in FL they opened Monday along with non-essential retail all at 25% capacity, Bars still closed.

Quite a few cars in restaurant parking lots today I noticed.

I've been seeing people on FB excited that they got to eat inside a restaurant. Ugh. I will NOT be until we can get this silent killer under control or even better be rid of it.
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Re: Coronavirus and Empty Restaurants

Post by cjd »

klkla wrote: May 7th, 2020, 5:48 pm
cjd wrote: May 7th, 2020, 5:25 pm Also just wondering, why you don't think this will drag on for years? Not saying I think that's wrong, but just wondering your reasoning for that. I have no idea myself.
I think eventually we will get our s--t together with testing. In the post above I mentioned one guy's idea of using these protocols that have been tested and used in somewhat similar situations. If not his exact idea, some version of what he's talking about will have to be done if we are ever going to move on absent a cure or vaccine.
Last night I saw this article, which seems to indicate that home testing may be on the way soon. Unfortunately it doesn't really address the greater ideas the Forbes article did, on mass testing of people who have no symptoms. So in that case, it still doesn't appear they are looking at testing as a means of getting the virus isolated in most areas, and letting the public going back out with confidence.

If people are still only going to be ordering the tests if they already suspect they have the virus, then the usage is little different than testing centers which require a doctor referral. Reactionary instead of pre-actionary. In order to get to where we can be reasonably sure people who are asymptomatic are clear, we would be having to test everyone very, very often.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/07/heal ... gates.html
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Re: Coronavirus and Empty Restaurants

Post by Alpha8472 »

I passed by a Hooters and the sign has been taken down. It looks like they are giving up. Even if they were to reopen, the atmosphere would not be the same with social distancing.

Some strip clubs have switched to drive thru stripping. You order from the menu and then you drive through a tent in the parking lot where a masked stripper does a show. Then they take tips with one of the grabber arms for picking up trash. Then you can pick up your food. So I've heard...
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Re: Coronavirus and Empty Restaurants

Post by storewanderer »

I don't know how restaurants and bars can survive with these rules. Between scared customers and an inability to "pack the customers in" to get high revenue, this seems like a losing proposition.
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Re: Coronavirus and Empty Restaurants

Post by veteran+ »

Alpha8472 wrote: May 8th, 2020, 8:40 pm I passed by a Hooters and the sign has been taken down. It looks like they are giving up. Even if they were to reopen, the atmosphere would not be the same with social distancing.

Some strip clubs have switched to drive thru stripping. You order from the menu and then you drive through a tent in the parking lot where a masked stripper does a show. Then they take tips with one of the grabber arms for picking up trash. Then you can pick up your food. So I've heard...
Unbelievable............I'm speechless.
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Re: Coronavirus and Empty Restaurants

Post by BillyGr »

storewanderer wrote: May 8th, 2020, 10:39 pm I don't know how restaurants and bars can survive with these rules. Between scared customers and an inability to "pack the customers in" to get high revenue, this seems like a losing proposition.
Since they are currently "surviving" with no one eating in, adding that as an option (even a limited one) doesn't change that. They are likely to either have a similar number of customers (just now with some in and some taking out) or gain more customers (those who aren't doing take out since they miss the atmosphere of eating at the restaurant).

Also, while no one knows exactly how long this will continue, they know it's not a permanent situation, so it doesn't necessarily make sense to make a long term decision now on what could turn out to be a (comparatively) short term issue.
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Re: Coronavirus and Empty Restaurants

Post by cjd »

BillyGr wrote: May 9th, 2020, 1:32 pm
storewanderer wrote: May 8th, 2020, 10:39 pm I don't know how restaurants and bars can survive with these rules. Between scared customers and an inability to "pack the customers in" to get high revenue, this seems like a losing proposition.
Since they are currently "surviving" with no one eating in, adding that as an option (even a limited one) doesn't change that. They are likely to either have a similar number of customers (just now with some in and some taking out) or gain more customers (those who aren't doing take out since they miss the atmosphere of eating at the restaurant).

Also, while no one knows exactly how long this will continue, they know it's not a permanent situation, so it doesn't necessarily make sense to make a long term decision now on what could turn out to be a (comparatively) short term issue.
I agree. I've actually seen quite a few people going out to eat at places where the dining rooms have reopened at even 25%. Parking lots that were empty in the last month now have a good number of cars in many of them.

I don't expect they will do it as often, or it may just be a novelty one and done thing. But I don't think it's hurting restaurants any to be able to offer it. I don't plan to eat in a restaurant though until the pandemic ends or we get it to where there is very little risk. But as soon as it's quite safe again I will be doing so again.
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Re: Coronavirus and Empty Restaurants

Post by storewanderer »

Here in NV, restaurants have been allowed to reopen for eat in with various guidelines. Most chains are still take out only, but a lot of independent restaurants opened back up for eat in.

One of the key guidelines is only 50% capacity. I also head somewhere they need to use all disposable tableware.

I was by one restaurant that was open and it was at 100% capacity inside and outside, no distancing whatsoever (layout of tables like the diagram in the big white paper klkla posted about how this thing spreads). Bar area had people right next to each other with no open seats in between. All glass cups and plates in use. Employees had no masks on. Obviously no sign of masks on the customers either. Customers talking, yelling, drinking, etc. Absolutely incredible. 75% of the cars in the parking lot at this place had CA license plates.

I did see one restaurant that was not very busy and had people sitting distanced and was using disposable everything.

I saw two other restaurants that were not very busy and had people sitting distanced and were using glass cups, plates, etc. No masks on the employees there either (and obviously not on the customers).
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Re: Coronavirus and Empty Restaurants

Post by BillyGr »

storewanderer wrote: May 10th, 2020, 10:24 am Here in NV, restaurants have been allowed to reopen for eat in with various guidelines. Most chains are still take out only, but a lot of independent restaurants opened back up for eat in.

One of the key guidelines is only 50% capacity. I also head somewhere they need to use all disposable tableware.

I was by one restaurant that was open and it was at 100% capacity inside and outside, no distancing whatsoever (layout of tables like the diagram in the big white paper klkla posted about how this thing spreads). Bar area had people right next to each other with no open seats in between. All glass cups and plates in use. Employees had no masks on. Obviously no sign of masks on the customers either. Customers talking, yelling, drinking, etc. Absolutely incredible. 75% of the cars in the parking lot at this place had CA license plates.

I did see one restaurant that was not very busy and had people sitting distanced and was using disposable everything.

I saw two other restaurants that were not very busy and had people sitting distanced and were using glass cups, plates, etc. No masks on the employees there either (and obviously not on the customers).
Not sure that the disposable thing makes much sense - if washing your hands gets the virus off them, you would think washing silverware and plates would do the same (if not more, as the water is likely hotter in a dishwasher).

Of course even if not required some might choose to do that over needing the extra help to wash, and many may have ordered large quantities of some things like that for the take out orders and just have extra on hand.
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