Social distancing 'not viable': Popular Bridgnorth cafe and ice cream parlour says goodbye to tearoom
As shops reopen across the region, one business has been constantly adapting in order to keep up with the ever-changing circumstances forced upon them.
But social distancing measures has meant they have been forced to decide not to reopen their tearoom, says the owner.
Giovanni's Ice Cream Parlour has been able to operate throughout part of the lockdown period, running a successful takeaway service in Bridgnorth for the last three weeks.
Owner Sam Amery, who runs the business and adjoining cafe with her daughter Izzy, has introduced a one-way system, utilising the two-door access at the premises in Cartway.
With queues kept to a minimum and hand sanitising facilities available upon entry, Sam said the new way of working has already become routine.
She said: "Because we've got a double entry, we've implemented a one-way system for coming in and out of the parlour which has worked really well for us and kept queues down.
"We've been able to operate fairly easy and there's only two of us working. When we've got the tearoom open there's usually three or four people working so we've reduced that down to two, myself and my daughter – it's been really good."
Viable
But while the popular ice cream parlour has been able to cope with the changes swiftly and efficiently, the adjoining cafe and tearoom has proven too small to sustainably implement social distancing.
Sam added: "We're actually not going to reopen the tearoom. We're going to stay doing what we do on the ice cream side and use the space for something else, yet to be decided.
"I think because we've seen how this side can operate, it works really well and we're happy with that.
"The tearoom itself is quite small so I think opposed to other businesses, such as Violet's Tea Room which has quite a large area, we've got a small space.
"If I've got to restrict that to less people, we only have 12 seats in total and it's not a viable solution.
"I don't see this as a negative because we can use it reinvent the business and set something new up – it's quite exciting really and we're really looking forward to it."
