WILLOUGHBY, Ohio — A pub owner in Northeast Ohio first made headlines when the shutdown began in March for donating part of his proceeds to his staff.
Now, he’s making waves again with an open letter to Gov. Mike DeWine on Facebook that’s been shared hundreds of times, saying the 10 p.m. cutoff time for alcohol sales doesn’t make sense.
St. Patrick’s Day was very different this year for Craggy Bogland’s Irish Pub in Willoughby with no customers at the bar, relying on to-go food orders to keep them afloat as the pandemic caused shutdowns across the state.
The owner, Dan Budreo, donated 20 percent of his sales to his staff that day knowing they were hurting, too.
He says over the past few months, business was still down, but it had been picking back up.
“I was down June was about 26 to 27 percent slower this year than last year, which was to be expected with everything going on,” he says.
But then the 10 p.m. drink cutoff went into effect, which he says slashed revenue another 15 to 20 percent.
“And I will be lucky to hit 50 percent of 2019 revenue,” Budreo says.
The damage really becoming clear during Thursday’s Browns game prompting him to write a letter to the governor on Facebook.
Budreo says no business owner wants to contribute to the spread of this virus, so he supports most of the mandates in place, but he says the 10 p.m. cutoff has essentially created a so-called power hour.
“There’s a rush of people who filled the bars, and then they order a bunch of stuff. And then you know you can have somebody order five shots and three beers and they have an hour, and they basically consume eight drinks in an hour,” he explains.
Then he says they take their party elsewhere—on the road or to house parties with no social distancing.
So he’s asking the governor to reconsider this mandate, suggesting a midnight hard cutoff.
When asked about this story, DeWine’s press secretary sent us this statement: “We have heard from communities like Akron, Columbus, and Dayton that have found this policy helpful towards reducing the spread of COVID-19. We will continue to review the effectiveness of COVID-19 orders as the pandemic progresses.”
