Restaurants in Saskatoon are feeling the heat with inflation costs causing more businesses to slow operations or close down.
“Operators are just choosing to close their doors. They’re working so many hours. It’s very difficult to find people to work. The rising cost of goods and services is really impacting them,” said Jim Bence, Hospitality Saskatchewan president.
With the cost of take-out boxes, employees, and food, itself, rising, prices are going up for customers.
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This means restaurants are becoming short-staffed again.
“You may be in a line to a restaurant and notice that there’s empty tables, but that could be because there aren’t enough servers and more likely not enough cooks in the back to produce the food,” said Bence.
They’re also struggling to get food and equipment in, due to the supply chain issues.
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“When supply chain issues, inflation issues, and employment issues are occurring simultaneously across the entire province, we will start to see more operators decide to either restrict their services, their hours, or close their doors completely,” said Bence.
Bence believes this could be harder on the hospitality sector than the pandemic.
“We, arguably, may be in a more difficult position now after the pandemic than we were during the pandemic. Because keep in mind all the federal and provincial supports are now over,” said Bence.