Opinion

The world within

It’s not an easy time for the publican’s pockets.

But neither is it an easy time for your bodily health.

Apart from the stress that Covid-19 has placed on your system – paying wages, affording rents, covering your own domestic bills and the future of your business enterprise when the pubs re-open, a number of those we’ve spoken to have also experienced a feeling of loss as a result of no longer working a busy bar.

Where once an adrenaline rush would be accompanied by the release of feel-good endorphins when you achieved the desired result, these days the stimuli that produced them are absent from your daily routine.

For most, the pub trade requires concentration. It’s not something that can be done while keeping one eye on something else. It’s something that vintners tend to pour their life and soul into – and you’ve been doing this for so long that it’s hard not having that daily/weekly/monthly goal any more.

As VFI Chief Executive Padraig Cribben pointed out recently, lack of clarity going forward is one of the most daunting features of this crisis.

Naturally, with so many unknowns, it’s hard to plan for the future.

So with this loss of control over what happens next, it might be best to simply focus on what actions you can take yourself.

One such action, if you’ve not already taken it, might be to set up a daily Zoom or WhatsApp group meeting with your staff to check how everyone is coping, to discuss more than just the business itself.

Bar staff, supervisors, general managers and proprietors can often spend from eight to 12 hours a day in each others’ company so to suddenly have this drop from existence is quite a wrench for everybody.

Some might use the daily Zoom/WhatsApp confab as a means to reassure worried staff that they’re not alone in all this, that they are very very much valued as individuals and that by everyone being in this unknown together they’ll be that much stronger for the future, whatever that may hold…. Stay safe – in both body and mind.


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