Well, the challenges keep coming and the direction for the hospitality industry is not great. Slowly, more and more areas of the UK are going into a lockdown, similar to the first national lockdown earlier this year. The novelty has worn off for most people and the prospect of locking down the whole country by default is looming ahead.
The regions affected are reluctantly going into the top tier of the current model with hospitality and any business that needs groups of people to engage and use the services on offer are having to close again! This is a double whammy as the furlough scheme comes to an end and the replacement scheme seems to address some of the issues businesses had with it, it will provide a level of financial support. The problem is that many high street names have already made people redundant and the prospect is more to come.
One business owner explained that the furlough scheme was great and it meant he could hold on to most of his staff. Making 4 or 5 redundant in the process of scaling back but being ready to re-reopen with the reduced number of staff when the lockdown lifted. All was fine but the furlough scheme now ends, the new scheme will allow staff to be held onto, and doing fewer hours work, getting 60% of salary.
It still means uncertainty and challenges for hospitality businesses with no real vision of what condition the business will be in and what the economy will look like in a few weeks or months time!