SPECIAL REPORT
Restaurant Business revisited some of the independent restaurant operators we spoke with during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. Here’s how they’re doing now and what they’re worrying about for the future. 5 YEARS LATER: HOW THESE INDIES HAVE FARED SINCE THE PANDEMIC
W hen Restaurant Business first spoke with Tim Baker in March 2020, he was the owner- operator of two full-service restaurants in Seattle, Percy’s & Co. and San Fermo. After the pandemic hit, Baker temporarily closed both operations and sent his employees home with their final paychecks, along with care packages made with the remaining food in the restaurants’ inventories. He called the situation “catastrophic.” By August of that tumultuous year, when RB spoke with Baker again, his restaurants had reopened but were bringing in less than half of their usual summer revenue. He downsized his staff, received Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) funds and wondered how long his dwindling bank account could sustain his business. Life looks a bit different for Baker today, five years after the pandemic upended the lives and livelihoods of independent restaurant operators around the country. Percy’s is still open, but Baker is no longer a part of that operation. He continues to run San Fermo, a cozy Italian spot in the city’s Ballard neighborhood, with his son, Sam, the chef. Baker commutes about 70 miles into the city several times a week from just outside La Conner, Washington, where he manages 34-acre Swan House Farm along the north fork of the Skagit River with his wife, Kelly. “We really didn’t have a choice,” he said. “We had to choose between our home in Ballard and the farm, and we ended up selling the house and just moving here because we couldn’t make both work. The downside of COVID for me was the financial burden of the PPP loan. It was both a really effective tool to keep the business open, but it was also just a lead balloon on your personal financial statement because it just sat there, looking like I had $500,000 in debt that I didn’t have. I had to sell my house and put the cash in to get the farm.”
HEATHER LALLEY
HEATHER.LALLEY@INFORMA.COM
30
RESTAURANT BUSINESS APRIL 2025
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