Restaurants have been putting the brakes on reopening their dining rooms due to the delta variant of COVID-19, which has thrown a wrench into recovery plans after over a year of coping with restrictions and consumer worries, The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported.
Some of them have been losing customers and trying to fit more diners into outdoor areas while it’s still warm enough to do so, the report stated.
Restaurants had come into the season with a sunny disposition as pandemic-related restrictions were lifting, and sales saw an uptick, according to the report.
But the delta variant sent them plummeting again. The variant has done away with some of the momentum in reopening the world as concerts are being canceled again, trips are being postponed and masks are being donned.
Bars and restaurants continued suffering in August. They lost a combined 41,500 jobs, which ended up being the largest monthly decline for any sector, according to the report, which cited figures from the Labor Department. That marked the food service industry’s first monthly decline since December.
Consumers responding to a survey of 1,000 adults by the National Restaurant Association are illustrating the trend as almost “one in five” Americans say they’re not going out to restaurants, the report stated. Nine percent have canceled existing plans to eat out in the last few weeks.
In other news, the delta variant disturbed the projections economists had forecasted for economic recovery by Labor Day.
Read more: Delta Variant Thwarts Economists’ Labor Day Optimism
The original expectation was that the presence of vaccines would help do away with the labor shortages around the country. Now, though, analysts say the double-team attack of slower-than-expected vaccine rates and the more contagious delta variant has made the outlook for recovery more complicated.
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