The florist
In a suburban shopping strip on Sydney’s Great North Road, Anne Koh opens the door to her cool room. The shelves are sparsely stocked – and not because she’s struggling to keep up with demand.
Koh manages the Garden of Eden florist in Five Dock and as the economic effects of the Covid-19 pandemic take hold people aren’t really buying at all.
“Normally we have a lot of flowers in the cool room. But I have to explain to customers we only have little flowers to choose from,” Koh says.
“Today, I haven’t had a customer. You can see lots of people on the street, but they’re busy buying something else.”
It’s been like this all week. The Morrison government’s social distancing measures are beginning to be felt, after the first major announcements restricting gatherings last Friday. Koh is prepared for things to get much worse over the next month.
Outside, people are shopping and at first glance life looks to be rolling on as normal. But they’re going to the supermarket, the chemist, the butcher, the deli. They’re not stopping at the florist, even if flowers are that thing we give at times of significance, celebration or trouble.
It is, says Koh, having knock-on effects.
“We don’t have customers, so we don’t get to go to the market. We don’t have garbage, so I call the garbage collector and say ‘don’t come tomorrow’. It’s affecting everything,” she says.
They’ve lost business from cancelled weddings and won’t be making wreaths for the RSL this year for Anzac day, a job that usually brings in thousands of dollars. Koh says the owner considered shutting the shop temporarily last week.
“I think I have to tell her to think about that for next week because there’s nothing, just one over the phone order, that’s it. It’s very, very shocking,” she says.
“If I don’t work for the next week, I have nothing. I have my husband and he’s not working any more because of back pain. I’m the breadwinner.”
The barber
Around the corner, Pino Catania is cutting hair and trimming beards at Pino’s Barber Shop. There’s an abundance of hand soap next to the basin.
Despite the precautions, business is the worst he has experienced in his 17 years of operation.
“This week, we’re 40% down. People are scared they’ll get the virus.” Catania says.
He’s made some changes to try to adjust. Some customers are coming in earlier than usual when things are quieter. Some are simply not coming at all.
“For the last two weeks, it’s the worst it’s ever been. This week has been the worst,” he says.
As for what the coming weeks hold, Catania says he doesn’t know. “I’m keeping positive but maybe we’ll stop.”
Benjamin Schimschal is a customer and decided he would still go for a trim on Thursday.
“I’m not scared of it, to be honest. I’m healthy, I don’t have symptoms,” he said. “I’m going to keep going out until they tell us not to go out.”
The restaurant
Next door, the Japanese restaurant Sushi Maru has seen its business drop by almost half.
They’re trying to get by through increased takeaways because, as the manager Jiseon Lee puts it, people don’t want to sit inside any more.
“When they are inside, they eat really quickly,” she says.
Lee says they’ve reduced their evening dining hours for the sushi train and are closing an hour early at 9pm. Staff are working shorter shifts.
On Thursday, just two customers were dining in for lunch, but Lee swiftly packed takeaways while talking to Guardian Australia.
“Everyone is suffering because of coronavirus,” she says. “It’s so quiet now, everywhere.”
The beauty salon
“I’m ready for whatever happens. If the government says close, we will close,” Shayla Tran, the owner of the local eyelash bar Eyelash Experts, says.
“But we still have clients who want to be beautiful.”
Tran is expecting at least two weeks of difficulty as people stay home and reduce discretionary spending.
Beauty treatments depend on physical contact and the health advice is to limit it.
Tran says she had two cancellations on Wednesday. Thursday was “so-so”. She thinks some salons, such as the skin clinics, are finding it tougher and have already closed.
Across the road, a hairdresser has a sign on its door telling customers to sanitise their hands the moment they enter the shop.
“I’m sure for the next two weeks it will be bad. But I’m ready,” Tran says. “Because for everybody, it’s the same.”
The cafes
“Have you watched the movie Contagion?” Rick Kim, the manager of Five Dock cafe Lab Kitchen, asks. “I watched it last night. Super corona. The future has happened.”
Kim is keeping his humour in what he says is “the worst scenario at the moment”.
He’s running the cafe on his own to reduce wage costs and has had to tell staff they’ll be getting fewer hours. The regular customers – young people and young families – are not coming. Out the back of the shop they have a garden with lounges and play equipment. There’s a single customer watching her two young children on the slippery dip.
“I think this is going to go on for the next six months,” Kim says.
Across the road, Adriano Biviano is the owner of Bar Piccolino, the cafe right next to Coles. He sees a line-up outside the supermarket every morning but his trade is down 40%.
“It’s pretty scary stuff here because I can’t pick the timing any more,” he says. “I used to know the rhythm of the day, when it would be busy and when it would be quiet. Now, one day lunch is good. The next day is a ghost town.”
Biviano says there is nothing he can do but “ride the wave”. He’s worried he might have to let good workers go.
“It’s really concerning. My main concern is if we get shut down. What do we do? How do I pay my rent?” he says.
The banking sector announced on Friday it will give businesses a six-month break from loan repayments, but there is little assistance on offer from anywhere yet for those who struggle to pay rent.
The butcher
One place, though, is busy. Betty Nguyen is the owner of Bendo’s Premium Meats.
For the past few days, there’s been a queue outside the shop in the morning. Customers who can’t find any meat on the shelf in Coles or Woolworths are now coming to her.
Nguyen can pin-point the moment things changed.
“Since that Friday when Scott Morrison made the announcement about mass gatherings, people are coming and panicking,” Nguyen says.
Customers keep remarking how good business must be for her at the moment.
“Everyone comes in and says it would be good for you, but it’s not,” she says.
Nguyen has seen the worst of human behaviour on display and is brought to tears describing it.
One customer abused her because an order she usually filled through Woolworths was not available. Others are stocking up on far more than they need. Nguyen is considering whether she might have to close the shop on a Sunday because wholesale suppliers are low on stock.
“My opinion is some of the greed is just crazy,” she says. “We do not have it bad in Australia. We have enough food.
“Please calm down.”
