Hill deals with snow slowdowns after 2nd nor’easter

Posted 3/14/18

A snowy Avenue on Thursday after roadways were plowed and sidewalks were cleared. (Photo by Pete Mazzaccaro) by Brendan Sample After two severe snowstorms in less than a week, local businesses in the …

This item is available in full to subscribers.

Please log in to continue

Log in

Hill deals with snow slowdowns after 2nd nor’easter

Posted

A snowy Avenue on Thursday after roadways were plowed and sidewalks were cleared. (Photo by Pete Mazzaccaro)

by Brendan Sample

After two severe snowstorms in less than a week, local businesses in the Chestnut Hill area are hoping that the worst of the nor’easters are over with the start of spring looming next week.

Many stores and restaurants were forced to close early or altogether on Wednesday, March 7, with the snow not only knocking out power, but also preventing both employees and potential customers from traveling outside their homes.

This lack of traffic and open hours drastically affects the sales of stores affected by snowstorms like this one. While it may be a regular occurrence every year, however, many owners and managers don’t have a strategy or specific plan to make up the lost revenue. It’s ultimately part of the job to get through the storm and simply move on.

“If you talk to people in our business, they all say the same thing, which is that you can never truly make it up,” said John Arena, owner of the Chestnut Grill. “It is what it is. You lost the sales. All you can do is keep moving forward and hope for some sunny days in March and April to hopefully make it up in some way.”

The way that recent storms have been negatively affecting area stores has certainly not gone unnoticed by the Chestnut Hill Business District, which seeks to support the business community both inside and outside of the region.

With the two recent snowstorms taking a toll on the community, both the CHBD and Chestnut Hill Community Association have been advocating for further assistance from Philadelphia city services regarding fixes to weather damage. With the snow causing a greater amount of fallen trees and road potholes than would be seen in normal weather, restoring travel conditions becomes a top priority for Chestnut Hill.

“Generally speaking, I would say that that the recent nor'easters and the damage they created have had a negative impact on businesses,” said Philip Dawson, CHBD executive director. “At one point during the week, both Bells Mill Road and Cresheim Valley Drive were blocked by fallen trees, making Chestnut Hill difficult to access from the south. Yesterday's [Wednesday’s] storm led people to stay home due to difficult travel conditions, which leads to a day of lost sales for many shops.”

Even beyond a lack of customer traffic, a number of stores also had to deal with power outages in the midst of the heavy snow. Because of this, not every business was able to stay open on Wednesday, but the ones that didn’t lose power completely were able to give local residents a place to potentially get away from their own de-powered homes for awhile.

“We always want to be here for our guests and to provide a safe haven for our community as a whole in these circumstances,” said Jason Savard, general manager of the Iron Hill Brewery. “We were fortunate to have power for the duration of Wednesday’s storm and in the days following which enabled us to deliver on that promise. Of course, the safety of our guests and staff is paramount and something we would never compromise. That said, all the credit is due to the skeleton crew that volunteered to help pull this off, many of whom are local to Chestnut Hill.”

For some businesses, however, the storm didn’t have as big of an impact on Wednesday’s business as it did for others. Russell Gowdy, owner of Kilian Hardware, noted that while the store closed at 2:30 p.m. due to a lack of traffic, there was no big uptick in sales of storm supplies before, during or after the snowfall. While there may have been a bit more salt and wood sold than at most times of the year, it seemed like people were simply more adjusted and prepared for this storm than usual.

“Usually there’s more people buying storm supplies at this point, but there was no panic from customers this time around,” Gowdy said. “Things are back to normal for this time of the year, so it was almost a non-event.”