Listen to Megan Bucholz of Local Table Tours on Marketplace on NPR
I commute between Denver and Boulder often for my food tours. I always listen to Marketplace on NPR while driving in the evening. My Economy is one of the recurring segments on Marketplace that I enjoy. They interview business owners and have them tell their stories of how this pandemic is affecting their businesses.
My Economy highlights stories of surprise successes, hardships, and hopes and dreams for the future. The host of Marketplace says to his listeners every single time, “tell us about your economy because we literally cannot do this segment without you.” After a year listening to him say that, I dropped them a line to tell them my own small business story.
I spoke to the producer and explained how Local Table Tours was essentially closed for almost all of 2020. The spring of 2021 started out as hopeful because vaccinations were happening quickly, things were opening back up, and travel was rebounding. However, it soon became apparent to me when I started planning tours that in addition to losing dozens of my featured restaurants to the pandemic, there were new challenges.
For example, understaffed restaurants close one or more days per week and/or operate for fewer hours. Also, places that used to be open for lunch, mid-day, happy hour, and dinner now only open from 5pm-close. That conflicts with my traditional 2-5pm tour schedule. Another challenge is chefs and servers might walk out of their jobs looking for higher pay and leave a place understaffed. That in turn means they are unable to host my tour. My dessert stop is closed the day I plan on bringing people there when the baker does not show up. The curve balls just keep coming.
I had been expecting to reopen and hit the ground running after my long hiatus. Instead, I have spent 2021 navigating obstacles to planning my tours that I had never experienced in the decade I have been operating Local Table Tours. Luckily, things are improving almost every week. New restaurants are joining our food tour lineup. Restauranteurs are adding additional days or hours of operation. Our current lineup of food tours is one I am very proud of and looking forward to expanding in 2022.
Be sure to listen to the Marketplace feature here: Tour firm struggles to regain ground as restaurants recover.
If you are a fellow business owner, contact the kind folks at Marketplace and tell them your story! They’d love to hear from you.