Restaurants open for sit-down diners
Many restaurants reopened their doors for sit-down diners on Monday, for the first time since the start of the lockdown three months ago.
Advanced Level 3 of the lockdown allows for sitting in under strict protocols.
The Restaurant Association of South Africa says even though they are happy about the sector reopening, the industry disagrees that alcohol may not be served, and gave government a week to provide valid reasons for why they made this decision.
Derryck Myers, co-owner of Butcher Boys, says this will affect their turnover as they make approximately 30% of their revenue through alcohol sales.
"Prior to lockdown, when the Minister stopped alcohol sales after 6pm, for the ten days, that dropped our alcohol sales by 10% of our normal turnover.
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"People don't dine out without having to be able to have a glass of wine or a beer or whatever they choose. Our restaurant is not conducive to dining out and not being able to have a drink."
Niven Govender, manager at an Umhlanga based restaurant, says they are well equipped to follow protocol and sell liquor.
"Most of our meals are more sit-down meals and people like to dine and wine. When you're having fish, you need a glass of white wine or your steak with red wine. We do a lot of beers and cocktails.
"We've got sanitisers right at the restaurants. There's protocols to follow. There's signage to follow, there's waiting staff with sanitisers with them all the time, so we can always follow protocol."
