The COVID-19 pandemic has impacted every aspect of our lives, so much more than any of us could have imagined a year ago when most of the world was still trying to figure out what COVID was.
The outbreak of COVID-19, a new coronavirus first discovered in late 2019, was declared to be a pandemic by the World Health Organization (WHO), which directs international health within the United Nations and leads partners in worldwide health responses, on March 11, 2020.
They did so two days after Gov. Ron DeSantis declared a state of emergency in Florida and two before then-President Donald Trump declared one nationwide. On March 15, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommended no mass gatherings and advised venues to postpone in-person events across the nation, which were soon followed by school closures, quarantines, lockdowns and every aspect of life that could do so going virtual.
One year in and COVID-19 has infected 118 million people around the world, with 29.2 million of them coming from the U.S. It has also taken the lives of 2.62 million people worldwide, with 529,000 of those being American lives.
The pandemic also devastated the economy. With shutdowns and social-distancing restrictions, businesses which were able to remain open were forced to limit customers and cut employees. Many small businesses were unable to survive the year and had to close their doors permanently.
A poll conducted by Lake Research Partners for Small Business Majority, which surveyed small business owners across the U.S., found 59% reported declined revenue during the pandemic with 60% reporting losses of more than 25%. More than half say the revenues are still down compared to last year.
The same survey found that one in every three small businesses were forced to cut employee hours and one in five reduced employee wages.
As people follow CDC guidelines like wearing masks and maintaining social distance – and with much-needed vaccines now being distributed – many small businesses are seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. Even so, they recognize that the impact of the past year will have lingering effects.
We checked in with several LGBTQ-owned and allied businesses to see how they are doing one year into the pandemic.
Community Cafe
Mandy Keyes opened Community Cafe in 2013, an eatery specializing in vegan and vegetarian fare. It served as a “home away from home” with inclusive events like Drag Queen Story Hour (DQSH) and more.
After being forced to relocate from its traditional home in St. Petersburg’s “gayborhood” in 2019, Keyes found sanctuary in the LGBTQ-affirming Allendale United Methodist Church. While maintaining the pop-up version of her restaurant and searching for a permanent home, the pandemic hit.
“We had originally thought it would be a month, maybe two, but that changed our plans,” Keyes says.
“We kept our eyes open to find a new location but knew that we wouldn’t really be able to move,” she continues. “We were very lucky to have Allendale because we didn’t have the kind of overhead that put a lot of other businesses under or into a huge amount of debt.”
While hosting events like DQSH weren’t possible during shutdowns, Keyes did her best to stay connected with the community. She launched Community Cafe’s pay-it-forward program in March 2020 to keep her kitchen open and feed frontline workers in need.
The program collected nearly $4,000 from supporters via the cafe’s website, funds the restaurant matched. Full meals and snacks were delivered to locations including Tampa Bay’s St. Anthony’s Hospital, Bayfront Health and St. Petersburg General Hospital.
“We started with the hospitals and fire stations and whoever else we could think of, including one special request to take some food to Publix,” Keyes says. She estimates up to 600 people were fed as a result. “It felt like something that we needed to do.”
Community remains Keyes’ focus, particularly since connecting with supporters has been limited. She’s since left Community Cafe’s pop-up location behind and is planning to move into her restaurant’s permanent home in mid-April to early May.
She won’t make the move alone. Keyes has formed a new collaborative concept with the likeminded Halelife Bakery and InVision Creative Cafe. The partners will present an extensive array of food and drink as St. Pete Community Oasis and are currently searching for retail businesses to join their ranks.
“I cannot wait to start having community events again,” Keyes says, noting the new location allows for COVID-conscious operation. “That’s really what I’m here for, what the cafe is here for, to have a space for a local community to connect with each other. Art, music, Drag Queen Story Hour and everything else will come back once it’s safe.”
A year of COVID-19 stressed how important events like those are. “We’ve all been so isolated this last year,” Keyes says. “It shows how interdependent we are on one another … we’ve all learned a lot.”
For more information about St. Pete Community Oasis, visit StPeteCommunityOasis.com.
MojoMan Swimwear & Clothing
April 1 will mark nine years since Lane Blackwell opened MojoMan Swimwear & Clothing. The community shop for swimwear, underwear, apparel and accessories fast became the go-to place for gay men to find sexy and stylish garments.
When businesses began to shutdown early in the pandemic, Blackwell turned MojoMan into a curbside pickup shop for his customers.
“People would drive up, we would ask what they needed and we’d get it, ring it up and bring it out to them. It was definitely a different way to do business,” he says.
Retail shops were hit hard in general from the pandemic, but MojoMan faced a unique challenge as a large part of his sales come from swimwear. As the shutdowns dragged on and events like Gay Days, Red Shirt Pride Days, One Magical Weekend and Tidal Wave were cancelled and large summer gatherings were discouraged, no one was needing a new swimsuit.
“Swimwear sales definitely did dip during that point,” Blackwell says, “but what was interesting is we picked up in sales with tank tops, underwear and shorts.”
Blackwell attributed the uptick in sales to two things: people stuck at home with nothing to do but shop online and bringing in a new, high demand product.
“I found a local guy down in Fort Lauderdale that made really good masks so we started selling masks,” he says. “We sold about 5,000 masks last year. That was a huge thing for us. When we started selling masks, it was that point in the pandemic where you couldn’t find masks anywhere.”
With mask and clothing sales balancing out the loss from swimwear, and with the help of the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP), Blackwell was able to keep his entire staff gainfully employed during the pandemic.
One unforeseen hurdle that came early on was keeping inventory in the store. Blackwell places many of his orders with vendors at a convention he attends every year in Vegas.
“The convention was in February last year, so right about the time that this stuff would have started to come in was when they closed us down,” he says. “At that point we did have a lot of problems with vendors cancelling our orders which caused trouble early on getting product into the store.”
Luckily, Blackwell says, having great relationships with his suppliers led to him being able to piece together enough inventory to keep customers shopping.
Something else that helped sustain MojoMan throughout the past year was support from the LGBTQ community.
“People we only see monthly or quarterly were coming in and saying ‘we are here to support you,’” Blackwell says. “We saw a lot of our customers coming in more often and buying more often because, as they would say, ‘we don’t want you to go anywhere.’ I think everybody kind of understood small businesses were in need of customers and our community really showed up.”
For more information on MojoMan Swimwear & Clothing, visit MojoManStyle.com.
GayStPete House
GayStPete House owner Brian Longstreth affectionately calls his bed and breakfast “this old house,” reflecting on its decades in St. Petersburg. The six-room locale, originally built in 1929 as a single-family home for city leadership, was converted to an apartment building in the 60s until finding its true footing.
It spent time as an illegal boarding house before Longstreth reimagined what it could be in 2000. He ultimately converted it into the LGBTQ-focused space it is now in 2008, attracting guests from across the globe ever since – something the pandemic undeniably impacted.
“It was a whole lot of uncertainty,” Longstreth reflects. “I was having a record year for room rentals and then half of March was shut down last year, and almost all of April. We missed a lot of our returning customers from Canada and Europe, and even some of our Northern guests were cancelling or postponing their stays. I still have people saying, ‘Oh, we’ll come in 2022, we’re going to skip this year.’”
Longstreth says at least 20% of his business stems from outside of the U.S., estimating he lost roughly $18,000 last March and April. Thankfully, most of his losses were ultimately offset by Florida residents seeking staycations.
“They don’t stay long, just two or three days instead of the usual week,” Longstreth says. “I’ve been able to introduce the property to a lot of Floridians who either never thought about a taking a close vacation or had never heard of us.
“Volume-wise, we’re back to where we were in the previous year,” he continues. “It’s just a little more work and a little more uncertainty, because we never know which days we’ll be busy and which ones we won’t. It’s certainly been a pleasant surprise to be able to continue operating.”
Tampa Bay’s LGBTQ community helped make that a possibility as well. In addition to serving as a bed and breakfast, Longstreth says locals have leaned on the mostly outdoor space to stay connected with one another through shutdowns.
“Several people have mentioned that they like the ability to get out and still see and talk to people,” Longstreth says. “It’s become a nice alternative to a bar for meeting people, especially for those that aren’t into that scene anymore.”
GayStPete House utilized the support to renovate its pool area last November, already a major draw for visitors. It was expanded to allow for more social distance, adding canopies for increased private seating and more.
“I think it has made a big difference for a lot of people that are coming to visit either for day passes or to stay at the house,” Longstreth says. “There’s always going to be a project and we’re always going to continue to upgrade and improve the property.”
That’s because St. Petersburg is continuing to grow as an LGBTQ destination, he asserts.
“St. Petersburg has a lot to offer people who want to travel and to travel safely,” Longstreth says, and he has the perfect place for them to stay.
For more information about GayStPete House, visit GayStPeteHouse.com.
Ranger’s Pet Outpost and Retreat
Ranger’s Pet Outpost and Retreat is a pet care business in Winter Park owned by Mike Fried and Rick Merrifield for the last 20 years.
Originally called Yuppy Puppy when Fried and Merrifield purchased it in 2001, the couple has grown the business from a 1,000-square-foot space to a 20,000-square-foot store that offers overnight pet lodging, doggie daycare, grooming, training, merchandise and more.
Fried and Merrifield were on vacation in Mexico when they started to hear about the spread of COVID-19 in the U.S.
“When we got off the plane in Dallas was the first time we saw a large number of people had masks on, and that’s when we started hearing about the pandemic,” Fried says. “When we got back to Orlando and we got back to our business, we started thinking ‘this is turning into something’ and I immediately called my bank.”
Fried and Merrifield started to put together a game plan to determine how to handle the pandemic when shutdowns started to happen.
“First thing we found out was whether we were considered an essential business, which we were, so then we needed to start thinking about how to protect our employees,” Fried says.
Ranger’s, which employs 50 workers, kept everyone safe by creating a valet service for customers dropping off their pets.
“We were servicing people out of our parking lot,” Fried says. “No clients came into our facilities whatsoever, we would meet them and bring their dogs to them after they had received their services.”
A large part of Ranger’s business comes from pet lodging when people are travelling and cannot bring their pet.
When the shutdown happened, most vacations were scrapped and lodging reservations were cancelled.
“Overnight half of our business went into the toilet,” Fried says. “The number of people who were calling to cancel was just frightening and we were watching what we expected to be a stellar year go to hell in a hand basket.”
Fried says he tried to take advantage of the PPP loans but had issues during the first round with his bank.
“We applied for the PPP, Bank of America helped me get the application processed and then silence from them,” he says. “Two weeks later, I got an email that said I successfully applied and maybe I’ll get money in the next round.”
Ranger’s wasn’t alone in their frustration. According to Small Business Majority poll, 57% found it challenging to apply for a PPP loan partly attributed to issues in trying to secure the loan through their bank.
Fried says they did need to reduce employee hours for a time but says they were able to keep any fulltime employees from going below 35 hours.
Ranger’s was able to get a PPP loan during the second round of assistance, thanks to help from Valley Bank. Something else that helped Ranger’s was an increase in one of their other services as the shutdown stretched on.
“Starting in late April, early May we started doing a fair amount of business with doggie daycare,” Fried says.
“There were so many people stuck working at home, then having the kids at home, mom and dad at home, having the dog at home; something had to give,” he explains. “And it was the dog.”
As we surpass one year in the pandemic, Fried says business in lodging is starting to go back up.
“People are starting to become more mobile and travel again,” Fried says. “It isn’t our normal size crowd but it’s much bigger than what it was last year. But we have a dedicated clientele, and I can’t tell you how many reached out to us and said ‘Whatever you need, we’ll be there for you.’ They have been great.”
For more information about Ranger’s Pet Outpost and Retreat, visit RangersPetOutpost.com.
Tampa Theatre
The Tampa Theatre’s doors first opened nearly 100 years ago, ushering patrons into a new age of extravagance and entertainment for just 25 cents. It was the city’s first commercial property to offer air conditioning, the perfect complement to its high ceilings emulating the night sky.
The movie palace quickly became a Tampa staple, as celebrated for its atmospheric architecture as it was its access to the silver screen. It has evolved through the decades into the cultural center audiences know today thanks to community support, a protected landmark managed by the not-for-profit Tampa Theatre Foundation.
Pre-pandemic, the venue hosted more than 600 events per year – including 30 years’ worth of the Tampa Bay International Gay and Lesbian Film Festival (TIGLFF) – offering a full schedule of first-run and classic films, live entertainers, events and more. That changed drastically March 11, 2020, the same day the CDC deemed COVID-19 a pandemic.
That’s when scheduled acts and audiences alike began to dwindle, a response to mounting coronavirus concerns.
“The morning of the 12th, we all came in and said, ‘I don’t think we can do this. I don’t think we can open tonight,’” Tampa Theatre Director of Marketing & Community Relations Jill Witecki recalls. “Those first couple of days, it was just going through the calendar and it was cancellation after cancellation.
“We were canceling things for the first couple of weeks and nobody knew how long this was going to last,” she continues. “Was it going to be a couple of weeks or a couple of months? Now we know.”
It was a full year, at least for Tampa Theatre’s traditional means of connecting with the community. Its remaining staff quickly pivoted to virtual cinema, working with film distributors to showcase films on mutually beneficial streaming platforms to recover what lost funds they could.
“We were able to jump on that quickly,” Witecki says, “within two weeks of shutting down. It was interesting for us because as a one-screen cinema, we’re only ever able to sell one movie at a time. Suddenly we could have 10 or 20 titles at once.”
That included LGBTQ-focused material, echoing the space’s longtime support for Tampa Bay’s LGBTQ community. While Tampa Theatre wasn’t able to host TIGLFF last year, which was held virtually in a first of its own, Witecki says it’s a partnership that will endure.
“It goes back to the first year of the film festival,” she explains. “We’re called Tampa’s living room and that’s what Tampa Theatre is. To have any group that comes back year after year and make the space their own, it’s just wonderful.
“As a nonprofit, we’re community supported,” she continues. “You really don’t learn what that means until it looks like it can be taken away.”
Tampa Theatre reopened one year after its shutdown on March 11 with new safety precautions in place, including updates to its air conditioning system for better filtration thanks to federal relief. Along with eager audiences, it also hosted a renewed optimism.
“Since 1926, Tampa Theatre has survived The Great Depression, World War II and all seven ‘Police Academy’ movies,” President and CEO John Bell says. “Soon, we’ll be adding ‘a global pandemic’ to that list.”
For more information about the Tampa Theatre, visit TampaTheatre.org.
