Closures reshape how IE restaurants do business
When the coronavirus pandemic took hold of California in March 2020, the impact was immediate on the dining industry.
At the time, it seemed the crisis would end quickly. What followed was 12 months of shifting policies, closings and reopenings as restaurants struggled to keep up with the changes, pivot and stay in business. Local restaurants relied even more on their surrounding communities to survive.
Now, there is a burst of hope with COVID-19 vaccinations happening and the ability of restaurants to partially reopen their dining rooms.
Inland Empire restaurateurs are cautiously optimistic their business climate will improve. But after months of scraping to get by, they are not yet relieved.
“I’m somewhat worried,” said Richard Munio, owner of The Sub Station, a Riverside sandwich shop that has been a hangout for college students for 49 years. “Do I think we’re going down the tubes? No. Am I worried that the economy is hurting? Yeah.”
According to research by the
National Restaurant Association in late February, most restaurants don’t believe it will get back to normal for seven months.
A step to normal is the return to indoor dining. Under California’s current color-coded system, Southern California counties have been allowed to offer limited indoor dining with the move from the most restrictive purple tier to the less restrictive red tier.
Indoor dining had only briefly allowed in Riverside and San Bernardino counties since Gov. Gavin Newsom issued the initial stay-athome orders on March 19, 2020, forcing restaurants to close their dining rooms. At the time, that left them with two options: takeout and
delivery.
Anja Walker, owner of the Soup Shoppe in Riverside’s Brockton Arcade, decided it wasn’t for her. She closed the restaurant, saying her business was all about people coming in and staying for hours.
By summer, restaurants’ stopgap had become outdoor dining.
Restaurants that didn’t have patios began setting up tables in parking lots and restaurants with patios began upgrading them to attract customers with an experience as much like indoor dining as possible with tents, planters, fans and space heaters.
Cities with quaint old town neighborhoods, including La Verne, Upland and Redlands, shut down streets to allow merchants to set up tables and booths. Big Bear Lake experimented with it for one weekend. Temecula closed Old Town Front Street but reopened it after receiving complaints from other businesses.
Walker reopened the Shop Shoppe in late October with half a dozen tables in the parking lot.
Now, restaurants aren’t ready to give up temporary outdoor dining.
“We didn’t think it would work, but it did,” Walker said.
While helpful, outdoor dining can’t make up for the volume and turnover lost by closing dining rooms, making it hard to pay rent, utilities, licensing fees and salaries.
Some restaurant owners started their own crowdfunding campaigns to help their staffs get through the loss of hours and tips.
In December, Munio made a more direct pitch, an “SOS” — Save Our Sub Station — on Facebook and Instagram.
“It is not a ‘given’ that we can weather this COVID-19 calamity,” the post said. “I am asking from my heart that you support us consciously. That means to make a special effort to cross town and do business with us.
“While it’s cliche to say: ‘We are in this together,’ in this case, it is true.”
Munio’s plea to his longtime customers has helped keep The Sub Station afloat.
“We’ve been in business 49 years,” Munio said. “We have a lot of people who were 20 and are now 60 and still around and using us. We’re surviving off the old-timers.”
The mood brightened considerably in recent weeks, with dropping COVID-19 cases and the arrival of vaccines. The National Restaurant Association reported a rebound in restaurant sales and hopes are revived of indoor dining returning sooner rather than later.
But the road forward isn’t clear.
“It is not a ‘given’ that we can weather this COVID-19 calamity. I am asking from my heart that you support us consciously. That means to make a special effort to cross town and do business with us.”
— Richard Munio, owner of The Sub Station
“We want to plan out until the end of the year. But things change so rapidly,” said Javier Vasquez, president and chief executive officer of Miguel’s Jr. “The governor could change his mind tomorrow and we have to adapt. Things change weekly sometimes.”
Quick service drive-thrus such as Corona-based Miguel’s Jr. have been busy during the pandemic due to relatively easy contactless service.
Miguel’s Jr’s newest drivethru opened in Lake Elsinore on March 9 with a design that reflects the reality of the pandemic. Assuming that customers will continue to prefer drive-thrus, it has a smaller dining room and no self-service salsa bar.
But responding to the realities of pandemic also means the loss of some businesses.
Miguel’s Jr., founded by Vasquez’s parents in the 1970s, has two full-service Miguel’s restaurants in Corona, but one is temporarily closed.
“I see the opportunity to keep one open,” Vasquez said.
He also predicted that people will dine out less.
“I feel that the full service industry will turn into more of a special occasion experience, birthdays, holidays and celebrations.”
Some restaurants will never return to normal.
Among them is Cheliz, a family-owned breakfast hangout in Redlands that Leticia “Letty” Silverio and her husband, JoseLuis Salazar, started so that their three children could have a better life.
In July, Leticia Silverio fell ill and many of her family members contracted COVID-19, including her parents. She took care of them until she was hospitalized. She died two weeks later, in August.
Cheliz has reopened with her picture on the door. But it hasn’t been easy, financially or emotionally.
“It was their income. It was also their dream,” said Silverio’s brother Ignacio Silverio. “It’s almost in memory of her to keep it alive.”
He said Cheliz has survived through the support of the Redlands community.
“Business is good. It’s not where it was before the pandemic hit. But it’s enough.”