Many of these small businesses are in the food and hospitality sectors, some are in the retail and services industry, but all have decided that their business is no longer viable in the current climate.
She said that the energy subsidy was overwhelming to think about at the time of the Budget, as she did not know how she would cover the rest of the bills that just"kept coming". "We opened for all-day breakfast, lunch and takeaways. Our customers were of all ages, and being in the town centre, people would stay here waiting for their minders, or children would come in after school.Jackie B's was closed for five months in 2020, and Jackie said that she was grateful for Government supports that helped her to re-open.
"I don’t think the Government thought down to us. It felt like they were saying 'thanks but, you can go now’.""I would love for members of the Government to come work here and see what I’m dealing with, but also see how a place like this has an impact on people's lives and well being," she said. She said the English market dropped off due to Brexit and while 2019 was a very busy summer, all this changed in March 2020.
"In 2019, if you put an order in on a Monday, you’d have the item within days but it was taking nine days. You had to be very conservative due to delays and cost impacts"."We knew that electricity bills were going up, and insurance has been rising for years but you need to pay staff and rates. Whatever cushion we had pre-Covid, it’s gone.
However, the rent for the branch at Stephen's Green doubled and over the summer the decision was made to shut the Rathmines branch. Since then the other two branches have also closed. "It was always an expensive business to run as suppliers were very limited due to the specialty nature of the products. Our vital wheat gluten, which is essentially a bag of protein, used to be €50 for 25kg, but now you wouldn't be able to find it for €100 or more," he said.
"Especially on social media, people only see the successes, but they don't necessarily see the stress and the struggle behind it.