Duriana V.
How did the Pandemic affect Delis?
Introduction
Everyone knows about Covid-19 and how it has affected everyone worldwide. It has affected individuals in their personal life. There are businesses from small business owners to medium-sized business owners. Everywhere there are businesses so they all got affected in some way type shape or form. I asked myself how did the pandemic affect Delis? As many know people stayed inside during lockdown and did not go out. And I experienced staying inside with my family during the lockdown. I wanted to find out how Delis were doing during the pandemic or the lockdown because I only went to the supermarket during the pandemic. During the lockdown, I and other students from all grades and ages had to turn to online classes for about 1 year and a half. That makes me wonder how Delis got through the pandemic and what did they do when everyone started to panic. I live in the Bronx and there is a huge amount of delis here so I wondered if all of them were able to get through the pandemic.
In a Business Report, it says, “ Some of the industries hardest hit by the Coronavirus are overrepresented in Queens, Brooklyn, the Bronx and Staten Island. That includes restaurants, retail stores, daycare centers, and nail salons, just to name a few.” Another reason why I decided to base my research on Delis is due to the number of delis near me. And due to students having online classes, they did not go physically to school so that also meant that they did not pass by the deli. It is also important to find out how delis got affected during covid because it can be useful to know what delis should do in the future when another pandemic starts. I decided to interview the delis instead of sending out surveys because of the questions I had in mind to ask the delis. The question did not involve quantitative measures but instead, it involved qualitative information. According to MarketPlace, Jasmine Garsd said that “In New York, the Bronx is among the hardest hit areas by COVID-19. Francisco Marte owns three bodegas in the Bronx, and he heads up the Bodega and Small Business Association in New York…Hundreds of bodegas in Marte’s association have had to close.” Furthermore most businesses needed loans from the government to be able to get through the pandemic. The U.S Small Business Administration (SBA) had a press release where they stated, “the SBA disbursed approximately $390 billion to nearly four million small businesses and nonprofits.”
Research Method
There were two different methods I could have gathered research data/information from which is between surveys and interviews. Surveys have questions that are close-ended or limited by a few answer choices while interviews have open-ended. When it comes to open-ended questions the interviewee (the person being interviewed) does not have to have a constrained answer. Open-ended questions provide more detailed answers or explanations. Close-ended questions can be answered with a yes or a no while open-ended questions do not.
Due to me gathering information through interviews I had to analyze my information by writing a thematic content analysis. Thematic content analysis is the most common method that is used to analyze information for qualitative research. And its main focus is to find similar patterns or answers/results. The steps are to get familiar with the data which means you have to reread, then do some labeling to the data (interview), search for themes with broader patterns of meaning, review themes to make sure they fit the data, define and name themes, in the end, you need to write it up by creating a coherent narrative that includes quotes from the interviewees. My thematic content analysis included everything from the highlighted (most important parts) of my interviews and finding similar themes that includes similar responses from the interviewees.
Results
After I finished reading and re-reading my interviewee’s answers I labeled (highlighted), looked for similar answers, and reviewed them. This is my thematic content analysis: Both people from the delis were in the business for 4 years plus. One had been working in the business for about 5 years and the other had been working at the Deli for about 20 years. For both, they experienced customers being cautious and people did not hang out together in groups as before. Further, people did not like it when others would get too close to them. And before the pandemic everything was fine but once the pandemic spread worldwide that is when Delis struggled with their sales. Once people were in a lockdown they barely went out. When the schools closed and the students stayed at home it affected the delis because students had school online and did not have to go out as much to buy, but for one of the delis, they had people get their sandwiches delivered to their door. The deli worker said, “It depends on how far away the students are from the bodega. If the bodega is close to the school, obviously if there are no classes it affects us because we sell to the students. But if we have a group of students nearby, sales will not go down. Some bodegas are dependent on a school. If there are no classes, obviously the deli will go down a lot.” The Delis started to get affected by the pandemic between March and May. One of the delis did not change their store hours during the pandemic and the other deli did change their store hours during the pandemic and they had to open late and close earlier. The revenues of the delis after the pandemic have not been the same. One of the deli did get help from government loans while the other deli did not need to get help from government loans. The deli worker stated, “the government provided many loans so thanks to those loans the deli managers and store managers were able to restart the economy inside the store. Thanks to those loans they were able to make up a little bit of the deficit left by the pandemic.” We are not going to say 100%, but at least it helped a lot.” The prices in the delis changed and items are more expensive but that it was not the delis that changed the prices and instead it was the wholesalers, he said, “It wasn’t us that raised the prices but the wholesalers so as you buy you have to sell so no one is losing out on the sales.”
For my community outreach, I went to my local church to explain what I found out about my research. First, I went in person to ask when I would be able to go give my presentation and Father Paul said that Thursday or Friday at 4 pm he would be available. Then I started preparing my presentation slides and wrote the most valuable information I received from my interviews. And I made sure that on each slide I had only one sentence or phrase and I included pictures for the slides except the last one. I went back on Friday at around 4 pm and gave my presentation to Father Paul. He said that he has heard many stories of stores closing. And now in the main street or popular place of our community Walgreens and Rite Aid have closed. And he said that he would go out for walks without masks, and he would not go out to see people. Furthermore, he mentioned that from what he understands is that when the business owners took loans they would be forgiven if they kept all their employees, and it would become a grant. But if they did not keep all their employees, they would have to pay back the loan. Also, Father Paul said that there were supply chain problems because factories were closed so how could you produce something and send it out without the factory workers? “If you had nothing to sell you had no income.” Additionally, he made a point and said, “it seems to me that if they were back at the income level that they had beforehand they would say, yeah, we’ve regained our income, but they are saying they are better, so that means that since the pandemic began it has been getting better but not necessarily where they were.” Safety measures and social distancing and masks have started to ease up and how during our conversation we were talking without masks. And the church also had to use government loans and had to fall back on its reserves.
Discussion
The implications that this research has for the future of my research area and my community is to be able to apply or use the information I found out through my interviews and try and use it to avoid mistakes or prepare things beforehand when I open up my small business. And now that I have learned some new things the delis have gone through it can help me to inform other businesses or people in my community about what to do when another pandemic starts. It is not easy for delis and businesses to get through the pandemic because they do struggle with sales and revenue. It is crucial to avoid what has happened during covid but to also use the hardships that we faced to learn from it and to better the delis and the businesses. In my opinion and based on my research I would say that some delis were more or dramatically affected than other delis.
When I went around my community to ask if I could interview about how the pandemic affected their deli, I remember that one of the delis said that they were closed during the pandemic and that is why I was not able to get an interview. Now that I know what some of the delis in my community went through I would recommend delis to make an emergency fund in case anything happens in the future. There could be another pandemic or dangerous weather changes due to climate change. Climate change causes heat waves, severe storms, an increase in droughts, and rising sea levels which can also cause people to stay inside their homes to try and stay protected. I think the effects that covid has had on my community are huge as I have witnessed businesses in my community close their businesses. Everything has changed and things have not been the same. Some delis were able to get through the pandemic because of the government loans but without that, they would have struggled and might have even had to close their business. Delis are an important part of my community because they have different types of products such as sandwiches, milk cartons, and daily necessities such as napkins and toilet paper, dish soap, and even medicine.
References
Garsd, JG. April 24,202. In some NY communities hard hit by COVID-19, bodegas are lifelines. Kai Ryssdal. https://www.marketplace.org/2020/04/24/in-some-ny-communities-hard-hit-by-covid-19-bodegas-are-lifelines/
Author’s last name, Initial(s). June 13, 2022. Four Million Hard-Hit Businesses Approved for Nearly $390 Billion in COVID Economic Injury Disaster Loans. Title of Journal, Volume(Issue), Pages. https://www.sba.gov/article/2022/jun/13/four-million-hard-hit-businesses-approved-nearly-390-billion-covid-economic-injury-disaster-loans
McGowan, CM. 2020 April 3 Business Outside Manhattan Hit The Hardest by Coronavirus Website https://www.ny1.com/nyc/all-boroughs/news/2020/04/03/report–businesses-outside-manhattan-hit-the-hardest-by-coronavirus
