Doug talks about the epiphany that he had about six months after their opening. “I realized that we were having a dramatic effect on the people that were working for us. Honestly, it made me a bit nervous, because I wanted everyone who came to work here to have a great quality of life. I want them to prosper and excel in life. It hit me, their ability to have a roof over their heads and food on their tables really depends on how well we do here.” The need to grow the business became all the more important, fueled by this original value. The deli has taken off; each month outperforms the one before.
Then the virus hit. “I knew as soon as the schools were shutdown, restaurants were about to take a big hit,” recalls Doug. “We watched as everyone started shutting down and thought, ‘Woah! What are we going to do now?’” The questions eating at the back of every business owner’s mind was should they close, hit the pause button and try to ride it out? “2-3 weeks into the pandemic, we never even thought closing was an option. We employ so many young people who depend on us for a livelihood. On the flip side we want to honor the Governor. It was going to be a challenge, but we just knew we had to figure a way to stay open,” Doug states. That’s when they called a family meeting.
Doug explains, “We didn’t know exactly what it would look like, but we knew we had to flip the entire business plan upside down if we were to survive. The new ethos was stay in your lane. So, I took on customer safety, Ben created the much–needed drive thru and focuses now primarily on General Management, Whitney manages the Supper Club, Julianne manages the drive thru, and of course John Berry our business intern does everything! We figured if we could each stay in our area of expertise, it would help us stay calm and focused as business became unrecognizable.” What happened next would surprise them all.