Confusion and betrayal for the catering industry!
Anger is growing and restaurateurs are at their wits’ end! What will they have to endure before they can reopen their establishments once and for all? To everyone’s relief, the reopening date was officially announced for December 10. Then, in the late afternoon of December 2, the Geneva Council of State reversed its decision and decided that the restaurant owners’ fate would be definitively decided on December 9, the day before the official reopening.
In other words, the politicians in place will be making their final decision less than 24 hours before the previously agreed date. As a result, no one yet knows whether the canton’s restaurateurs and cafe owners will finally be able to welcome their customers. It’s a real political cacophony, and a thick fog hangs over the restaurant world!
This slap in the face is one insult too many for a profession on the brink of collapse. How can the members of the Conseil d’État be so unrealistic? Can’t they see that it is organizationally impossible to open a restaurant in 24 hours? Can’t they see that there are logistics involved in ordering fresh produce, and that their decision prevents restaurateurs from managing their stocks properly?
When a dish comes out of the kitchen, it has to be delivered, stored and set up, and all these operations take time! Can’t they see that such a decision has repercussions for the entire food industry, i.e. market gardeners, winegrowers, butchers and all the local craftsmen who depend entirely on this long-promised reopening? How will the latter be able to deliver 2,000 restaurants in 24 hours that have remained closed until now?
Domaine de Chateauvieux © Switzerland Tourism
“It’s revolting!
For Philippe Chevrier, emblematic chef of Domaine de Châteauvieux and owner of five other restaurants in Geneva, this political and sanitary about-turn shows a lack of discernment and respect for an entire profession: “Forcing us to close for the first time in 24 hours and reopen in 24 hours is an insult to the restaurant industry. Even though we immediately put in place the necessary sanitary measures to comply with the imposed protocol, we are the only ones to be subjected to such relentlessness, as if we were in an arena where a few individuals are giving up the ghost for the kill”.
The two-starred chef from Satigny can’t understand why the restaurants couldn’t open at the same time as the stores, and believes that the players in the sector have become the bêtes noires of this crisis over time: “Letting us believe that we’ll eventually be able to welcome customers again, and putting us in a position where we may be forced to choose, is scandalous and revolting! There’s going to be a lot of damage.
Le Bologne ©Dylan Perrenoud
Capacity
Florian Le Bouhec, owner of Le Bologne restaurant in Geneva, is similarly at a loss to understand such a lack of cohesion and discernment: “The Conseil d’Etat implies that an opening would be possible on the sole condition that the restaurant’s capacity is drastically reduced. Working in such conditions is unbearable, we might as well not reopen at all”.
According to an article in La Tribune de Genève, the police are even in a position to carry out administrative closures in the event of non-compliance with this allocation of available space. “I don’t recall ever seeing police officers enter a supermarket crowded with customers and ask them to leave. The public authorities would never dare touch supermarkets. When I see streetcars packed to the rafters at Christmas time, I really don’t understand it.
For Bertrand Lutaud, owner of the restaurant Yeast in Carouge, it’s impossible to manage fresh produce orders in such confusion. “This decision completely compartmentalizes us and prevents us from planning ahead. We work with perishable goods that have to be ordered according to the period, the season, budgets and our occupancy rate. How can we do this without any guidance?”
Like all his colleagues, Bertrand remains patient, but is nonetheless seething inside, wondering when this nightmare will end: “Walking around like this, it’s almost as if it’s all been done on purpose. Without a clear decision, we can’t move forward! There’s no other economic player suffering what we’re suffering.
