‘I’m Pleading With the Government:’ LA Restaurants Respond to Lockdowns - Eater LA

"The second [shutdown] is probably three times as hard as the first one. We’re still trying to bounce back from the first. It costs about $12,000 a month to operate my business. But if I’m closed, those bills still have to be paid, and they don’t stop coming. We closed for five months. When they started allowing us to do business outside, that helped us a lot. We were doing okay. The PPP loans they gave us helped some of the employees, but it still was not enough to sustain the business. We’ve taken out another loan; it’s eating up everything. I had a savings account with $113,000, and I’ve used up all that money just to keep up the business. I don’t have that cushion for the second wave. I’ve been open for six years. We sell Louisiana food and the theme is Mardis Gras. People don’t understand we’re not Buffalo Wild Wings; we don’t have that kind of traffic on a normal basis. I don’t get why you can go to Walmart and it’s jam-packed, but you can’t go to a restaurant with 40 to 50 people eating outside." - Mona Holmes