Two local restaurants have closed temporarily in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, joining thousands of others nationwide struggling to survive in a year-long expectation of social distancing.
Sirloin Stockade and the Garage Pub and Gill are the two closing temporarily.
Sirloin Stockade owner Peter Jurrema said that his restaurant closed Dec. 1. The restaurant posted on social media that it would be closed until spring, though Jurrema said that the reopening date will depend on certain factors.
“A lot has to happen,” he said. “For starters, the virus needs to be tamped down or lessened.”
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Sirloin Stockade was practicing COVID-19 protocols, including masks, surface sanitization and regular temperature checks for staff, he said. However, people aren’t as eager to go out, especially to a buffet-style restaurant, and sales were a third of what they were at the same time in 2019, Jurrema said.
“We just basically ran out of cash,” he said. “We were paying bills slowly because the money was not coming in. And we got to a point where our bills exceeded the money coming in.”
When asked if there was a possibility of the business closing for good, he replied, “Anything’s possible.”
On Nov. 28, the Garage Pub and Grill announced on Facebook that it would be closing for a time “for the safety of our staff and patrons.”
“It isn’t socially responsible to encourage crowds or have live entertainment, which is what we are known for, and continue to put our amazing staff at risk,” the restaurant said in the social media post.
It also stated in the comments that is “closed until further notice” but hopes to reopen in the spring. Prior to this, the restaurant announced that it would be closed for the week of Thanksgiving.
The Garage Pub and Grill is one of six restaurants who are city tenants and have received rent relief from the city. The others are Orange Leaf, Subway, Luciana’s, Bucceto’s, and Lucabe Coffee. The Columbus Redevelopment Commission recently voted to provide 100% rent abatement for all six restaurants from Jan. 1 to June 30 of 2021.
All of these restaurants received a 100% rent abatement from April to July, and most received a 75% abatement from August to December. However, the redevelopment commission approved a resolution in July to provide Orange Leaf and Subway, the two interior Commons restaurants, with continued 100% rent abatement until The Commons reopens. Unlike Luciana’s and Bucceto’s, Orange Leaf and Subway have no exterior entrances and have been closed since March, when The Commons initially closed due to the pandemic.
The Columbus Board of Aviation commissioners voted last week to provide five months of rent relief to Blackerby’s Hangar 5. This will last from January through May next year. According to commission president Mark Pillar, this includes 100% relief of utilities, rent and “the per-plate expense.”
Pillar said that the request was “warranted” and that when people think about dining at the airport, they think about Hangar 5.
“I don’t want to lose that,” he said.
Hangar 5 owner Caleb Blackerby told the board that it wouldn’t be “viable” for the restaurant to stay open without assistance.
“The Hangar has seen down sales all year due to the pandemic, but in the weeks since the governor’s new restrictions, our numbers are ranging from 35-45% of average sales,” he said.
Gov. Eric Holcomb’s Nov. 13 executive order states that, “while capacity limits (for dining establishments) are not longer based on a percentage of overall occupancy, seating must be arranged and maintained so that individuals, households or parties are spaced at least 6 feet apart from any other individual, household or party.”
It also states that customers “must remain seated” while eating and drinking and “when otherwise remaining on the premises.”
Local health officials have placed restrictions on restaurants as well. The COVID-19 Community Task Force on Nov. 20 announced that for Bartholomew County, “dining room food service . . . may not exceed 50% capacity adhering to social distancing guidelines.” For bars and bar seating at restaurants, that number is lowered to 25%.
Kurt Schwarze, co-owner of Fourth Street Bar and Grill, said that his restaurant likely hasn’t hit 50% capacity since Nov. 1. Furthermore, outdoor seating has dropped in popularity since the weather changed — so much so that he called it “nonexistent.”
He noted that some customers are changing their meals to “off times” if they dine in — for example, 3 p.m. on a Tuesday — in order to avoid busyness.
Schwarze also said that while carryout sales have picked up somewhat, they could use more support in that area. He said that Fourth Street offers carryout, curbside — and, starting Dec. 7, they began offering delivery both downtown and throughout Columbus.
It’s the first time the restaurant has offered delivery, he said, and orders can be placed online or by calling the restaurant. Carryout and curbside orders can also be made online or via phone call.
Fourth Street is also partnering with Fresh Take Kitchen, Schwarze said, as the latter restaurant has been closed since March. Schwarze and his wife, Kelly, co-own Fresh Take with Steve Leach (who also owns the Garage Pub and Grill).
Schwarze said that some of Fresh Take’s most popular soups will be made in its kitchen by its staff and then “offered for sale through Fourth Street carryout or delivery,” he said. He said that Fresh Take Kitchen will make the profit off these soups.
“Our hope is that we can start building some demand for FTK (Fresh Take Kitchen) to reopen in the early part of 2021,” he said. “At this time though, until some of the office workers return to work downtown, re-opening FTK will be difficult.”
While Fourth Street Bar and Grill is open, it did close briefly for the week of Thanksgiving, which Schwarze said is normally the restaurant’s “busiest time of the year,” especially when it comes to the night before turkey day.
“We didn’t really expect it to be the same as a normal year, but if it was anywhere close to as busy as it normally is, it’s not something that we wanted to promote and be part of,” he said. “So we wanted to make sure that people were being encouraged to stay home and celebrate small, instead of going out and doing a normal night before Thanksgiving celebrations with a lot of different people.”
Schwarze said that with the Garage Pub and Grill closing for winter and other restaurants also eyeing closure, the downtown landscape could look different soon.
“An increasing number of places have closed downtown,” he said. “There really may not be a lot of us left by the end of the winter. We’ll just have to see. Our intention is to keep our staff working, and we hope we’ll get the support that will allow us to do that. So at this point, we have no intention of closing over the winter, but we have to have some level of business that will enable us to support having our staff come in every day.”
He added, “Without substantial carryout support and dining support in general, a lot of the restaurants downtown are going to be in trouble.”
One bright spot came on Thursday, when downtown merchants, including Fourth Street Bar and Grill, participated in “A Not So Silent Night” and offered special promotions in hopes of attracting customers. Schwarze noted that his restaurant didn’t see much of an increase in business, as the downtown event mostly attracted families. However, in talking with other businesses, he heard that “A Not So Silent Night” helped them somewhat.
“There were a lot of families with children and just an overall increase in activity compared to the recent normal,” he said. “The weather was nice and it seemed people wanted to get out and about at least a little bit. I think ‘A Not So Silent Night’ is becoming an annual tradition, and while this year was down a little in activity because of COVID, there were still people who wanted to keep the tradition going.”
The National Restaurant Association Research Group recently estimated that as of Dec. 1, at least 17% of “all eating and drinking places” — over 110,000 in total — are “closed and not open for business in any capacity.”
The research group noted that in some cases, these closures are already permanent. For others, time will tell if a temporary change turns into doors being shut for good.
“The vast majority of permanently closed restaurants were well-established businesses, and fixtures in the communities in which they operated,” the research group stated in its report. “On average, permanently closed restaurants had been in business for 16 years. 16% of these shuttered restaurants had been open for at least 30 years.”
