South End restaurants successfully start to reopen dining rooms at half capacity

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (WBTV) - Right now, restaurant owners in South End are feeling a little bit of relief after a busy first weekend in Phase Two of the North Carolina reopening process.

“Historically, Memorial Day weekend, you’re not that busy, but we were busy,” Suffolk Punch general manager Shan Sheheane said. “We had a great weekend.”

Indoors and outdoors, the demand for Suffolk Punch continued into Monday.

“We received our PPP loan so we were able to bring back all the fulltime staff,” Sheheane said.

Every other table is closed off and the bar stools are gone.

The employees also learned some lessons from handling the unexpected.

“When it started raining, we had to stop serving because everybody tried to come inside," Sheheane said. "We had to move guests into other buildings to get out of the rain, still maintaining social distancing.”

Across South Boulevard, Mac’s Speed Shop is also bouncing back.

“We did about 70 percent of what we did last year which was very encouraging. It was more than we thought we were going to get,” marketing director Callie Murray said.

The restaurant is set up for social distancing and everyone is adapting to the changes.

“The biggest thing is changing out gloves in between every guest interaction because you don’t want to pass on somebody else’s germs to the next guest," Murray said.

Employees say guests are willing to comply with changes.

Customer Johnny Corcoran is already looking to the next phase.

“I think we should all reopen North Carolina as soon as possible, the economy needs us,” Corcoran said.

Several restaurant owners say they are hopeful to be able to reopen to full capacity later this summer.

For now, they are taking it one day at a time and learning as they go.