Happy May 1st to all of our guests, employees, and our community as a whole. We hope that you are staying safe and well throughout these strange days. Per our last post, we wanted to update you on our progress on the opening of the 2020 season.
As you might imagine and are probably well aware of, this is a nightmare scenario for us all in many ways, but our small business community has our own set of unique challenges on formulating a future wherein we can open for business safely, keep our employees, customers, suppliers as safe as possible, and stay solvent through free-commerce as opposed to loans, bankruptcy, and total government assistance.
There is only so much that these already overwhelmed agencies can do and it will become incumbent upon small business owners and entrepreneurs to figure out a way to a safe, successful future. As we have said in the past, we have made it through Superstorm Sandy, derechos, and severe economic downturns before, and we just all need to seek out the lemonade from the lemons and find new ways to serve our community.
One of the biggest challenges in formulating a plan has been getting up to date accurate information, and deploying that information efficiently into a several step phased opening, As of today, we are still fine-tuning our phased plan to the best of our abilities, which must be subject to changes as they unfold. We also feel the need to update you, our valued guests, on our progress, as many of you have reached out for updates. We truly do appreciate all of the support that you continue to show our little family owned business as we attempt our 68th year serving the community!
We are setting tentative, separate opening dates for both sides of the Margate Dairy Bar & Burger, with walk-up, window service ice cream sales beginning on Friday, May 15th, and burger bar food service through on-line ordering, phone orders, and self-serve kiosk on Thursday, May 21st. Our dining room and restrooms will remain closed until the next phase is approved by the powers at be.
We will be deploying social distancing signs, sidewalk distancing decals, and other measures to try and mitigate the issues that come with crowds, but we will need your help and consideration to attain both short and long-term success to that end. As you might imagine, it’s been hard to keep the “herd” in lines, practicing proper hygiene, as well as proper social graces long before this virus, regardless of level of education or financial wherewithal. We have found through experience that “Herd” mentality really does exist in almost all of us, and now we just need to bring the herd into this new norm and we feel that together we can accomplish a brighter future and many more years of great family memories.
We are first and foremost about the safety and well-being of our staff members. To that end, we are providing face shields for all customer service representatives, masks, gloves and training on proper constant food service hygiene (as always!). We are obtaining safe, effective special sanitizing products to clean surfaces constantly. In addition, our staff will be “checked-in” daily with an evaluation of their temperature and any symptoms. Any staff displaying abnormal readings will be sent home BEFORE starting their shift.
Our guests MUST help us on their end to meet these guidelines as a condition of service, regardless of their feeling of “good health”. We would ask that guests use masks and abide by social distancing measures, not only for their own safety, but out of consideration for those who share their desire to get out and grab a bite or a cone. We are kindly asking that you exit the property promptly after receiving your items so that we can allow others the same safe courtesies. This is a hard one for us, as we know that hanging out at the dairy bar is what all the cool kids want to do, regardless of age! We hope to get back to that vibe one day, but today is not that day. We would also ask that those with compromised immunity be patient and NOT come out and mingle just yet, as we want you to stay well and be able to hang with us once this passes for years to come.
We are working with the city on plans to provide curbside pick-up of burger bar items through on-line and phone ordering, as well as tenting our parking lot and using it as a safe, socially distancing waiting area for walk up self-serve kiosk from the back glass garage entrance. We can’t do on-line ice cream ordering just yet, as we just can’t anticipate keeping up with the volume while also keeping the product properly frozen. Thanks for your understanding and patience, ESPECIALLY in reading this rather long post! Hope to see you soon
