Restaurants lose big on wasted food and cancelled bookings

Restaurants lost a sizeable chunk of income during the power cuts over the past two weeks as they had to refuse and cancel customers’ bookings.

MaltaToday visited several restaurants in Birgu and Kalkara but the story they told us was similar to that of other localities impacted by the lengthy power outages.

Restaurants along the Birgu waterfront and near Bighi in Kalkara told this newspaper that they were hit by power outages on Friday 21 July, where most of them spent the entire day with no power and had to turn customers away. Unfortunately, power did not return to the area before Saturday afternoon, meaning that the restaurants also lost out on lunch service.

D Kalkara Regatta, a restaurant near the Kalkara marina told MaltaToday that during the power cuts, the business had to throw away around €6,000 worth of food. This sum, does not include the income lost from bookings that were cancelled. To make matters worse, the owner of the business told MaltaToday that the power cut occurred on one of the busiest days of the summer.

The owner of the restaurant, Kenneth Camilleri also expressed his frustration towards the fact that during the power outages, his business had to rent generators in order to try and stay open, but to no avail. Camilleri said that when he was reaching out to people to find a generator to rent, he was told that many of the generators on hand were already being rented to restaurants and businesses affected by the power cuts.

This restaurant owner was not alone in his frustration. The owner of a small restaurant at the Birgu waterfront who did not wish to be named said his business had to throw away between €350 and €400 worth of stock.

Another restaurant in Kalkara stated that no less than 53 bookings were cancelled due to the power cuts, which does not include the customers who come without reservations, which, according to the owner, averages between 25 to 35 customers on a Friday. The owner said they were very worried regarding the eventuality of prolonged periods where their restaurant would practically be burning money.

Other restaurant owners told MaltaToday that due to the uncertainty surrounding when power would be restored, “we had to keep staff around just to wait in case the power came back,” meaning that workers were paid for a full day’s work while the restaurants made no income on the day.

Meanwhile, other areas of Malta where restaurants were not as affected as those in Birgu and Kalkara still had problems to operate. For instance, restaurants in Wied iż-Żurrieq had fewer hours without electricity, but when speaking to this newspaper, many owners said that the blackouts posed different issues.

When asked whether or not the power cuts had affected their work, one owner said that the restaurant had not suffered any major losses, but jokingly said, “look at my eyes. I couldn’t sleep at all without air conditioning these past few days.”

The overall impact of the extensive power cuts has yet to be quantified but small business owners are keeping their fingers crossed the relatively cooler weather will persist throughout the rest of summer.

Meanwhile, at an urgent meeting of the Malta Council for Economic and Social Development last Friday, the social partners asked for compensation to mitigate the impact of the power cuts on businesses and consumers.

Government has committed itself to issue some form of compensation but did not provide the social partners with any details.

Prime Minister Robert Abela and Energy Minister Miriam Dalli told the MCESD that government will double the yearly budget to improve the electricity distribution network to €30 million from €15 million in an effort to improve resilience.