While restaurants and other places are not allowed to serve customers indoors and the weather is getting cold enough to drive even the most stubborn customers from the outdoor areas, delivery and partnerships with store chains seem like the only solution to ensure the survival of this industry put at 17 billion lei last year, which employed more than 120,000 people, according to their reports to the Trade Register.
The officials of the City Grill group, one of the leading restaurant businesses in Romania, said a few months ago that under the new circumstances, they decided to start two new lines of business – home delivery and a ready-to-eat and ready-to-cook line of products, available in Profi stores.
“We will expand the partnership to other networks. It’s a different type of business, for which one needs a different type of know-how, infrastructure and equipment, but is the closest to the restaurant business. Those who want to stay on the market must act accordingly and go into home delivery, catering or partnerships with supermarkets,” City Grill CEO Daniel Mischie says.
Calif restaurant group, too, signed a partnership with a wholesaler, which allowed it to put a number of its products on the shelves of some of the Mega Image supermarkets.
Other food and drink service industry businesses took their products to modern retail chains, such as Ana Pan bakery, pastry and cake shop chain, Starbucks coffee shop chain, which had done some time before the pandemic, and DropShot Coffee Roasters.
Industry insiders say some of the businesses in the sector have already closed, others are contemplating it, and if things continue like this for too long, one third of the businesses might disappear. There are a little more than 45,000 restaurants, cafés, bars and other such places in Romania.
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)