Will Local Craft Brewers Close for Good in Coronavirus Pandemic?
While this article focuses on investing, let me start off by acknowledging the pain of those who are getting hit the hardest: Small restaurant, brewpub, and brewer owners and their employees. My sincerest hope is that things recover as quickly as possible. Hang in there.
As it turns out, the brave new world where households spent more on eating out than at the grocery store was never meant to be. Or it was a foreboding omen of times to come. Either way, according to U.S. Census Bureau, numbers that showed eating and drinking out briefly ticking higher than the average grocery bill in 2019, there are already early signs that the trend is reversing in grand style. According to data collected by Black Box Intelligence, full-service establishments saw year-over-year foot traffic decline 3.7% through March 8, 2020 (before everything began to shut down over COVID-19), and limited-service fell 3.1%. In Seattle, traffic was down 10.4%.
An unlikely scene in America at the moment. Image source: Getty Images.
Source Fool.com
