🔒Downtown Hartford merchants, restaurants struggle to find a new normal

A handful of customers dropped by Vietnamese-inspired restaurant Bahn Meee in downtown Hartford during the noontime lunch hour of a recent sunny Tuesday.

Most grabbed paper bags filled with takeout orders and left after passing a few friendly words with owner Dung “G” Tran.

Tran’s small Ann Uccello Street restaurant filled about 100 orders a day before COVID-19. During the height of the pandemic, it had less than a dozen daily orders. He was forced to close his original, larger Capitol Avenue location.

These days, Tran’s Ann Uccello Street eatery is back up to around 70 daily orders, but customers’ comings and goings are far less stable.

“Before COVID, business was pretty predictable,” Tran said. “Monday you will start off and each day will get busier and busier, and Friday would be really busy. Now it is the opposite. Sometimes Monday and Tuesday will be our busiest days. I know people who work for Aetna and they say their office building is mostly empty. State (office) buildings are empty four days a week.”

Downtown Hartford foot traffic has picked up considerably since corporate offices reopened in early spring. But with many employers still offering hybrid or completely remote work options, center-city merchants, particularly restaurants, say business is still down — in some cases significantly — from pre-pandemic levels. Even more challenging is that spikes and lulls in traffic are less predictable, making it harder for merchants to operate their business.

David Griggs, CEO of the MetroHartford Alliance, said restaurant owners have told him lunches on Mondays and Fridays have gone dead but Tuesday-through-Thursday crowds have bounced back, although not quite to pre-pandemic levels.

“That is a direct hit from COVID,” Griggs said. “There is no other way to explain it. … It’s a new reality that is just now starting to emerge that is forcing our restaurants to rethink how and when they operate. You see a lot of restaurants that don’t even bother to open on Monday anymore.”

Unfortunately, the lost Friday traffic hasn’t shifted to another day, Griggs said. That business has just evaporated.

Timothy Moore, founder of Hartford-based economic development consultant Blue Haus Group, said it has been hard to find a solid pattern for in-office work.

“When we contacted some local employers to ask when their employees are in the office, their hours were all over the place,” Moore said. “There really is not a good answer for it.”

Office attendance optional

Most of Aetna’s 5,400 Connecticut workers are based in Hartford and returned to the office two to three days a week as part of a hybrid schedule beginning March 15, according to parent company CVS Health.

The Hartford, another large Hartford-based insurance company, has about 4,000 staff based in the city. More than half of these work remotely, according to the company. Many others work a hybrid schedule, visiting the office as needed for collaborative work, according to spokesperson Suzanne Barlyn. And some chose to predominantly work in the office, she said.

“We’re embracing our ‘place of purpose’ focus that affords all employees the same access to career development and empowers on-site, remote and hybrid team members to succeed together,” Barlyn said.

Moore said downtown restaurants and retailers will have to be more flexible moving forward. Downtown traffic has increased in recent months, but the unpredictability of it makes it difficult for small businesses to plan inventory and staffing. Understanding the flow of in-office hours in the city is important to businesses and economic development planners alike, Moore said.

“At some point we will figure out what the new flow looks like, but I think it will take a little while,” Moore said.

Entertainment's more prominent role

The unpredictable customer flows have made major downtown events much more important drivers of local business, Moore noted.

Ken McAvoy, owner of Agave Grill on Allyn Street, said his busiest night of the year came on May 9, when WWE Monday Night RAW wrestling came to the neighboring XL Center. A sporting or entertainment event can quadruple sales, he said.

“When Journey comes and it’s on a Wednesday, it’s going to be like Cinco de Mayo in here,” McAvoy said.

McAvoy said he has seen an obvious uptick in office workers in recent months, although still well below pre-pandemic levels.

Agave’s sales were down about 70% in 2020 and 40% in 2021 compared to 2019, McAvoy said. He estimates sales this year will be at least 75% of what they had been pre-pandemic. McAvoy has cut his staffing levels by half since the start of the pandemic, down to about 15 employees.

“It actually has settled into somewhat of normalcy, definitely not normal compared to prior to COVID,” McAvoy said. “Our lunches Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and even Saturday are very consistent. Nowhere near what they were, but consistent. If I look at sales today and from last week, they will probably be within $100 of each other.”

Rising commodities prices

McAvoy said he’s worried about ballooning food costs. He hasn’t increased menu prices yet, but there is considerable pressure. McAvoy expects to spend an extra $15,000 this year for chicken and cooking oil alone. Big spikes are expected for cheese and other ingredients.

McAvoy said he’ll contemplate ways to reduce costs while retaining quality. It might mean slightly smaller portions or servers asking customers if they want beans with some entrees rather than automatically piling them on the plate.

Tran, from Bahn Meee, said ingredients he purchases from Asia began rising earlier and have jumped far higher than food supplies from elsewhere.

He’s turned to making his own hot sauce. He branched out to jarring it and selling it through West Hartford’s A Dong Market. Tran said he has staff mixing batches during quiet periods. Sales have gone so well that Tran is looking for space to scale up production.

Closing the gap

Steve Abrams, managing member of Max Restaurant Group, said the flagship Max Downtown restaurant on Asylum Street had a “fabulous” May, something he ascribes to graduation parties and COVID-weary people treating themselves. He said weekday lunch traffic is down, but evening and weekend visits are up, helped in part by free valet service.

Max Downtown employed about 100 people before COVID. Now it has 61 but is looking to hire a dozen more to help with increased traffic.

Unlike some owners, Abrams said he has seen a definite new pattern of slower lunches on Mondays and Fridays.

“You can tell when people are in their offices,” Abrams said.