Local businesses have been badly affected by the pandemic, restaurants being hit hardest.
Although many restaurants have reopened, they have had to reduce guest capacities and, in many cases, their staff.
And some restaurants haven’t reopened at all, especially on the Strip, where the visit is far from before the pandemic.
In the past three decades, the local gastronomy scene has grown tremendously. Has this spurt come to an end? Or will Covid-19 force it to evolve?
Longtime local food writer John Curtas recently wrote on the subject for Desert Companion’s Fifth Street newsletter.
“There is no doubt that 30 years of progress was wiped out in about 30 days,” Curtas told KNPR’s Nevada state.
Curtas leads back the city’s culinary revolution when some of the bigger steakhouse chains like Ruth’s Chris and Morton’s settled here in the late 1980s. That brought celebrity chefs like Wolfgang Puck and Emeril Lagasse to it.
Now he argues that the progress that Las Vegas has made from poor buffets and 99 cent cocktails to a food destination over the past 30 years has gone and is not coming back.
“I don’t want to be too pessimistic because there is no bigger cheerleader for local restaurants than me,” he said. “But I’m not sure Las Vegas will ever get back from it. Certainly not in my lifetime. I don’t see it happening.”
Curtas realized that there are two different stories in the Las Vegas dining scene: one is the Strip, which he described as the “beached whale,” and the neighborhood dining scene, which is successfully trying to adapt.
“But [neighborhood restaurants’] Expectations are also much lower, “he said.” Those giant strip restaurants, especially the famous ones, are based on gross sales of at least $ 1 million a month and nobody is. ” [making] that now. “
Curtas said he was far more confident about the survival of restaurants off the Strip than restaurants on the Strip.
However, the pandemic may just have accelerated a process that was already underway. Curtas said many of the once great restaurants on the Strip were seeing slower sales and showing their age – even before the coronavirus pandemic broke out.
“I think we had peaked in Vegas in terms of our restaurant and food scene … probably a few years ago,” he said. “You can see that a lot of these places are showing their age. They didn’t make as many numbers in 2018 and 2019 as they did a few years ago.”
Alexandria Dazlich is the director of government affairs for the Nevada Restaurant Association. She agrees that the food and beverage business is tough right now, but she’s far more optimistic.
“I think there will be a demand for fine dining, celebrity chefs, and unique experiences that only the Strip can offer,” she said. “After all, people from all over the world come here to see the strip. I don’t think it’s going anywhere.”
But it’s this change in experience, even in a casual dining restaurant, that Curtas says is really damaging the industry.
“The dining out experience includes socializing and a place where you are comfortable and know the menu and the staff will greet you by name and you will know what your favorite cocktail or beer you like there – or you have one Favorite starter – and you come in and everyone is in a good mood. That’s gone, “he said.
He added that people are doing their best to overcome the restrictions like mask requirements, but he believes that if you don’t see people smile, a key component of the hospitality industry is lost.
“This is not a recipe for fun. This is a recipe for sitting in a dentist’s chair, ”he quipped.
While the dining experience has changed due to the health restrictions, it is the decreased capacity that really hurts restaurants.
Dazlich said that every restaurant operator would have difficulties with a capacity of 50 percent, but her group is not pushing for the indoor restaurant to be reopened early.
“Our number one priority is the health and safety of customers and employees,” she said. “We want the Nevada Restaurant Association to continue promoting the recommended required guidelines from the governor’s office and local health authorities.”
The real solution, she said, is a vaccine to make people feel safe to be outside again.
“I think at the end of the day it’s pedestrian traffic. It’s about the crowd. So if we can find a vaccine there really won’t be a problem [fear]”, She said,” I think once that is eliminated there is really nothing left to hold people back. “
In the meantime, Dazlich and her association wish that an aid package from the federal government would finally be adopted to help all restaurants that work to stay afloat.
Although Curtas is pessimistic about the future of Las Vegas gastronomy, he hopes he’s completely wrong and that Duzlich is right to be optimistic.
“I’m looking forward to the day when these things will prove to me that I was wrong because I don’t want to be right,” he said.
