Serving in masks and extra space: Restaurants reflect on reopening plans

Anyone who may be getting tired of their own kitchen table and feels ready for a night out with a friend or a spouse will now have the opportunity.

Many Saskatchewan restaurants are to reopen Monday at half capacity and serve customers face to face once again. It’s the first day of Phase 3 of the Re-Open Saskatchewan plan.

Sitting in the empty dining room at Memories Dining and Bar the week before reopening, owner Thomas Siarkos said he was very thankful for the support from the community through social media posts and orders for takeout through the past two months during the COVID-19 shutdown.

Siarkos said the whole building has been thoroughly cleaned right down to shampooing the carpets, booths and chairs.

“As you can see, we have reserved signs on the tables which means that these tables won’t be used. Everything has been (done) according to law for six feet apart,” Siarkos said while describing the measures taken at Memories.

The servers will be required to wear masks and the restaurant ordered an additional 20 washable cloth masks in addition to the current supply of 50. Supplies of hand sanitizer have also been brought in and everything is ready to go.

In addition to tables reserved for empty space, Siarkos was pleased to see a lot of bookings from customers eager to return on opening day.

Siarkos wants all customers to feel comfortable coming back to the restaurant with plenty of space at half capacity.

“We don’t intend to create a huge crowd and be back to Square 1,” Siarkos said, referring to the risk. “We will comply with everything because we want our business to open and we want to capture the losses that we have incurred so far.”

While he doesn’t like to see what has happened to the world or the way businesses have been suffering, Siarkos said these past two months have offered a new perspective on different ways to do business. That’s why Memories will be launching an app to continue with online orders for takeout and even delivery.

Pub owner ready to see friends and customers again

Tim Rodgers is part-owner of the Lancaster Taphouse, which will be a few days late to reopen. It has spent the past few months cleaning, doing minor repairs and even developing a brand-new menu to welcome customers back.

“My business partner and I have been sitting in an empty restaurant for a couple months so just for the feels on the heart alone I think (reopening) is going to be great,” Rodgers said.

“When you own a pub, your customers get to be some of your good friends so we’re really looking forward to getting to see some of those people again and our staff — obviously we haven’t seen them — and just taking that first step back to whatever normal is,” Rodgers said.

The Lancaster was already taking some steps to spread tables out to keep a six-foot distance in the last week before closing under public health orders, so Rodgers is confident staff can maintain space between customers.

At 50 per cent capacity, seating will be limited and the tables will be spaced out more. For the first while, Rodgers said the Lancaster will only be accepting guests by reservation.

“We’re going to be making sure we’re having a record of everyone who comes in here. God forbid the virus comes back and we need to know who was in here, so we’re going to be keeping track of that,” Rodgers explained.

Thanks to the wage subsidy offered by governments, Rodgers said the restaurant will be able to hire one or two extra staff on duty all the time just to keep up with the extra cleaning required to be safe.