Rochester Games and Arcade reopen

The challenge of reopening during a pandemic

Imagine opening a business just for it to be shutdown months later by a global pandemic.

K?

"*i?

"*m?

"*t new ?

"* kaleb gillock ?

"* joins u with the story of one businesses owner faced with that reality ?

"* ?

"* kaleb ?* has he managed to stay afloat?

Katie and george... rochester games and arcade opened it's doors to the public in december... offering an arcade... retro video games and consoles... as well as my personal favorite... axe throwing.

Unfortunately.

..

Covid?

"*19 forced them to close temporarily... but they were able to reopen today... in what the owner tells me was a nerve?

"* wracking decision.xxx nervous trying to get people back in the door.

It's a changed world so it's scary.

Will people come out for entertainment?

We need them to but you never know.

When rochester games and arcade celebrated it's grand oening in december... co?

"*owner ?

"* jason schiffer ?

"* never imagined what would happen a few short months later.

As business began to pickup... covid?

"*19 forced the doors to close.

Schiffer says it's been challenging to stay afloat.

It's been a struggle to keep everything going because we have about 40 employees combined between all of the locations and a lot of people have been laid off you know, so we've had a lot of different help with government funding and everything else that we can get but it's been limited... it's been rough.

So how does a business such as this manage to stay afloat?

After all... you can't offer curbside axe throwing.

That's where the retro video game sales came to the rescue.

This location was actually open for curbside gaming and one of our other locations is well known for it... so we did more video game sales like the nintendo type games and cartridges than ?

"* we did more cartridge sales in that one time than we did the year before.

Safety is of the upmost importance at this hands?

"*on venue.

Social distancing is being enforced... gloves and masks are available... equipment is being continually wiped down... and there will be no sharing of the axes during a visit.

Even with these steps ?*- and more ?

"* in place... schiffer remains fearful.

What if governor walz turns back the dial... ?

Or there just isn't enough business... we have had a lot of talk about whether or not it's worth opening and we honestly don't know.

We're basically going to test the waters.

If we're here for the next two or three weeks and we've got nobody ?

"* then we'll shut down again and we'll wait a few more months out.

We're not planning on going anywhere ?

"* we've got a lot invested in this town.

We don't want to see this place go so there's a lot of passion you heard jason mention testing the waters... and part of that includes the decision made today for management to be the only employees in the building with customers this weekend./// thanks ?

"* kaleb.

That's to allow them to properly guage the amount of staffing needed since they are limited to 25?

*- percent capacity.///