coronavirus in Geneva
The owners of the bistros are delighted to start working again, but want to keep the RHT.
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- Jérôme Faas, Léonard Boissonnas
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Vincenzo d´Oro, owner of Il Colosseo pizzeria, will have to go from 70 to 35 covers to reopen in accordance with the conditions laid down by the Federal Council.
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“Obviously, I’ve been measuring my restaurant for an hour“, explains Vincenzo d´Oro, the owner of Colosseo, a pizzeria in Plainpalais. Like most of his colleagues, the Federal Council’s announcement of this Wednesday, allowing restaurants to open from May 11, surprised him. But the good news comes with a constraint: tables of four guests at most, with a space of two meters between them.
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50% less cutlery
It is this distance, even if it is well understood by restaurateurs, that prevents them from jumping for joy. “For the distance between the tables, I would have preferred a solution like in Austria, with one meter rather than two, says Blaise Gumy, owner of the Café du Center in Molard and Pied de Cochon in Old Town. Depending on the layout of the room, it will be complicated, but it is a lesser evil.“
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The restaurateurs have done their calculationss. All those questioned will lose at least 50% of their cutlery by spacing the tables. “If the weather is nice and I can use the terraces, we will limit the damage, hopes Julien Bernard, owner of the Babel cafe in Bardonnex. Otherwise, it will be hot. The worst scenario would be to open 50% and get RHT.“
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“Two more months and we were screwed up”
Vincenzo D’Oro believes he will be able to get by “fair, fair“ leaving two part-time workers, whereas there are usually seven people, including him, to work. Blaise Gumy, who employs around sixty people, plans toorganize a tourus. “At noon, I think that with the recommended measures, my restaurants will be running halfway. We will have to take away because we have no choice.“ Owner of the Elephant in the Can, in Plainpalais, Yoan Lomet also plans to set up a tourus between his employees, “with teams reduced by 50%“.
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Despite everything, these restaurateurs rejoice. “The unknown is the envy of customers, comments Vincenzo d’Oro. But that’s good news: another two months of closure, and we were screwed up.“ Ditto for Blaise Gumy, for whom the take-away sale, started on Tuesday, “barely covers electricity“. As for Julien Bernard, who was starting to “find the long time“, he jugand that the proposed solution is not “of course not viable, but less worse than now. But we really start out in the dark.“
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User friendliness hampered
There remains the thorny question of bars, where respecting two meters distance seems more complex than in restaurants. Yoan Lomet, who practices both restoration and thirst quenching, judges that for the latter, “it will be very complicated, because it is the behavior of people that you will have to manage, tell them to stay at the table, etc. Not all the user-friendliness will be possible.“ The president of the society of cafetiers and restaurateurs, Laurent Terlinchamp, does not hide that “some bars will be too small to reopen. But they will have help. It is not possible today to have answers on a case-by-case basis.“
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“There will be support”
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Laurent Terlinchamp, president of the society of cafetiers and restaurateurs, is positive. “Today I heard a reopening date, yesterday I didn’t have one. We will already rejoice.“ Regarding the concerns of its members about RHT, it moderates. “They are legitimate, but let’s take a little time. There will be quite an accompaniment. Employees will be entitled to RHT. It is clear that with 30% of customers, making 100% of turnover will be impossible.“He also observes than “many establishments will not be able to reopen because they cannot comply with the two meters between tables.“
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Health measures to be defined
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GastroSuisse must communicate to its members the health measures and other protection plans to be put in place in the various establishments. According to Laurent Terlinchamp, “these measures will be communicated to us this evening or tomorrow.“ For the time being, restaurateurs are waiting for instructions.
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