Food safety in hospitality
What kind of measures have restaurants, cafés and pubs taken this year to ensure their premises remain COVID-19 safe? Essity’s Jeremy Bennett looks at how hospitality venues have reacted to the crisis.
It was completely unprecedented when restaurants, cafés and pubs were told to shut their doors in March 2020.
Cases of COVID-19 were rising alarmingly and the closure of such premises was considered vital to prevent any unnecessary mixing. So, when the decision was made to reopen hospitality venues in July, every effort had to be made to ensure the safety of diners and pub-goers.
However, this created a dilemma. A trip to a pub or restaurant is all about the warm ambiance and the welcoming experience. How could a venue deliver these ideals in a socially-distanced world, where strict rules had to be applied?
Various models were adopted to solve this issue. Social distancing was necessary, so some venues created space by thinning out tables in seating areas. They also introduced one-way systems to prevent customers from invading each other’s space.
Smaller venues found it hard to reduce the number of covers without severely impacting on profits, so they opted instead to separate the tables from one another using protective plastic sheeting or plexiglass screens.
Some pubs and restaurants were able to use their outdoor spaces creatively, erecting self-contained huts where groups could safely congregate away from other customers.
However, social distancing was only one of the challenges faced by hospitality venues. They also needed to prevent the virus from being spread via hand contact.
This made life particularly difficult in premises where food was served. All table decorations had to be removed along with cutlery, condiments, napkin dispensers – and even the menu sometimes, with customers being urged to peruse online menus instead.
China plates and metal cutlery were considered to be a potential health hazard by some venues, so these were replaced with recyclable alternatives. Individual sachets of condiments were offered instead of salt and pepper pots – and even these were only available on request.
Another potential sticking point for the hospitality industry were the washrooms. These needed to be kept scrupulously clean and could not be allowed to become over-occupied. Queues outside were also considered undesirable since these would encroach on the space of staff and fellow customers.
Some venues solved this issue by asking customers to alert a staff member when they needed to use the washroom, while others introduced strict one-way systems or red/ green signage to ensure that only one person occupied the facility at a time.
34 | FOOD SAFETY AND STEAM CLEANING
Local and national lockdowns have meant that venues have only been allowed to open periodically since July, but many have had the ingenuity to adapt their models to create an improved customer experience.
It quickly became clear, for example, that eating a meal from a cardboard carton at a table surrounded by plastic screens was nobody’s idea of a good night out. People tend to frequent pubs and restaurants for the buzzing ambiance, the opportunity to people-watch and the friendly interaction with staff. If none of these options were on offer, what was the point in going?
So, venues set to work on providing a balance between a warm welcome and a safe experience. Creative solutions were mooted to resolve the social distancing issue: for example, some restaurants ensured that tables were already ‘occupied’ by items such as mannequins, cartoon dragons and cardboard cut-outs. These provided a talking point and an Instagram opportunity while ensuring that diners naturally spaced themselves out.
Other venues responded to the social-distancing challenge by lending their customers giant headwear. A number of Burger King outlets in Germany offered sombrero-sized crowns to keep people apart, for example, while a chain of German café bars gave out headgear in the shape of helicopter propellers to achieve similar results.
Some of those self-contained huts set up to allow friendship groups to ‘bubble’ proved unpopular because they were little more than glorified sheds. So, sympathetic designs and strategic settings were employed in a bid to provide a more pleasant ambiance. For example, the glass-sided edifices overlooking the canal set up by Amsterdam’s Mediamatic Eten restaurant quickly became highly sought-after among customers.
Many venues decided to reinstate menus – either in wipe- clean laminate form or in a single-use paper format. They also enhanced the perceived value of their meals by serving them on plates once again, since these would be washed afterwards anyway. While condiments were no longer automatically placed on the tables, salt and pepper pots were again available on request.
The washroom stumbling block also proved to be easier to manage than had initially been feared. Demand for the washrooms was lower than usual because social distancing requirements meant that fewer covers were typically being offered.
Some smaller venues took the simple step of leaving the outer washroom door permanently open, enabling customers to tell at a glance whether anyone was inside. This also removed the need for washroom visitors to touch the door.
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