Holiday Catering Takes A Hit In Woodland Amid Tighter COVID Restrictions
WOODLAND (CBS13) – As the holidays arrive, restaurants are hungry for ways to stay afloat in what is their busiest and most profitable time of the year.
Catering Manager Tito Delatorre showed us his empty banquet room at Morgan's on Main. He has several indoor spaces to serve guests but Yolo County's downgrade to the purple tier has him in the red.
"We can get up to 300 people in here throughout the entire service area," he said. "That's huge and right now at this point, I'm averaging now about 45-50 people a day."
Delatorre his business is down 75% and the tighter restrictions just don't make sense in what is typically a very profitable November and December with holiday parties.
"We can do a $15-20,000 day. We are not even doing that in a week right now," he said.
Delatorre said outdoor-only operations have required him to spend more than $10,000 for a tent for his back patio and move holiday reservations and parties to other locations the Morgan family owns: Like nearby Maria's Cantina and Morgan's Mill coffee, beer and wine bar.
"It's easy for them to say stay home, but for us, our livelihood depends on it," said James Morgan, the owner of Morgan's on Main.
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Management expects cancellations as coronavirus cases surge.
"But when we get more heavily regulated after we just picked up steam and added more shifts for people, we have to cut those shifts because we can't just keep spending money to lose money," Morgan said.
Morgan's on Main has applied for a city grant to offset the cost of weatherizing outdoor operations. Businesses are bracing themselves for not only winter weather, but the cold financial reality it brings this holiday season.
"This community already does a great job helping us out and supporting us. But how much can you support us when you only have 11 tables?" Delatorre said. "Every day I wake up and try to figure out what we can do to drum up business."
