‘Things might get worse.’ Several Miami restaurants voluntarily close as COVID-19 spikes.
David Rodriguez shut down his bar before anyone told him to close it.
As COVID-19 cases spiked across Florida last week, he worried about the health of his employees and customers and voluntarily closed inside seating at his five-table Union Beer Store in Little Havana.
“After seeing 10,000 cases in two days, we decided it wasn’t worth it to put our guys at risk,” Rodriguez said. “We think we did the smart thing.”
Two days later, after Florida registered a then-record 8,900 new cases on June 26, the state banned all bars from serving alcohol for drinking on-site. The next day, Florida added 9,500 more cases. And another 8,500 Sunday.
Union Beer Store went back to offering craft beer and natural wine for takeout and delivery only. And many other restaurants in South Florida are making a similar decision.
Once desperate to open their doors to pay bills and rehire employees, some Miami-area restaurants are now voluntarily closing their dining rooms to stop the spread of the coronavirus. For many, the danger to their staff and diners — even while operating at no more than 50 percent capacity — isn’t worth the investment or risk.
“It’s like restaurants themselves have a life-threatening disease now,” said Matt Kuscher, who closed his two Coconut Grove restaurants temporarily this week over concerns that employees had been exposed to the virus. “And you’re going to have good weeks and bad weeks.”
Meanwhile, other states are rolling back their restaurant plans. New York is reconsidering reopening inside dining, according to Eater NY, and Texas recently closed bars and limited restaurant seating capacity, according to the Houston Chronicle, starting June 29.
Several Miami-area restaurants have closed their dining rooms for a variety of reasons, but all of them involve Florida’s coronavirus cases. Many have posted about their decision on social media, creating a scrolling list of virtual “now open” and “now closed” signs.
The latest was Miami chef Michelle Bernstein’s Café La Trova, a restaurant, bar and music venue that won national acclaim and was voted one of Esquire’s best new restaurants in the country. The restaurant had received a forgivable loan from the federal government to help keep employees on payroll through eight weeks.
Two days after those eight weeks ended, the restaurant closed again, temporarily.
La Trova had been skating by with a dining room well under 50 percent capacity with the necessary social distancing to keep diners safe, said co-owner David Martinez, Bernstein’s husband and business partner. It wasn’t enough to pay employees, the live band and the rent, Martinez said.
Most of La Trova’s 80 employees will go back on Florida unemployment.
“I hate to say it, but I don’t believe we’ll be the last ones to do this,” Martinez said. “Things might get worse before they get better, and we need to prepare for that.”
Restaurants caught breaking social distancing and mask rules face public shaming on social media as well as government fines and crackdowns. Some have voluntarily posted about positive coronavirus cases, alerting diners that they have closed to sanitize the restaurant and test employees. (The state of Florida has not been posting restaurants with COVID-19 violations among its regular restaurant inspection reports.)
This is the new reality for restaurants, said Kuscher, owner of Lokal and a new Kush location in Coconut Grove.
His Coconut Grove Kush, formerly The Spillover, was open just 15 days when it posted that it was closing temporarily because an employee had shown flu-like symptoms. Kuscher closed his nearby Lokal hamburger and craft beer spot for the same reason.
And on Monday, he switched his original Wynwood Kush location back to takeout and delivery only. The three tables he was allowed to keep inside, he said, were not worth staffing the dining room while COVID-19 cases are increasing.
“We didn’t want an outbreak,” said Kuscher, whose fourth restaurant, Hialeah’s Stephen’s Deli, remains open. “It wasn’t a difficult decision because people’s safety is at risk. It’s just difficult to go through.”
The Design District’s Mandolin Aegean Bistro, MIA brewery in Doral, and Shots in Wynwood have closed due to coronavirus concerns and told customers as much on their social pages. Mandolin, which is scheduled to reopen July 3, wrote that its employees will undergo weekly testing from now on.
“It was not our intentions to alarm you but felt it was important to be transparent because this can happen to anyone,” Mandolin owner Anastasia Koutsioukis wrote on her personal Instagram page and the restaurant’s page. “Think about that every time you have not worn a mask. I have. It is important we all do our part. As an establishment we cannot control what happens outside our blue gates. So please get tested, wear a mask, and be kind.”
The ongoing risk of coronavirus means some restaurants will be rethinking their business, La Trova’s Martinez said. His restaurant will begin catered, weekly family meals, and Martinez and Bernstein are contemplating some kind of “La Trova at home,” where diners can experience the music and feel in their own home. The details are still in the works, he said.
Kuscher says his restaurants will periodically only offer takeout and to-go meals. But that is not a model that is sustainable — or one he wants to do for the rest of his career, he said.
Until then, this pattern of opening, closing and reopening will continue, Kuscher said — until a business can no longer survive.
This story was originally published June 29, 2020 at 4:54 PM.
