Lake Orion businesses face financial strain amid Oakland County water main break
A water main break that happened in Auburn Hills, Michigan, on Sunday may take an estimated two weeks to repair, according to officials. A disruption of that length would have a devastating impact on businesses in the surrounding communities.
Waterside Social has perfect views of Lake Orion, Michigan, from its patio. The restaurant sat empty on Sunday, on what would have been one of its busiest days of the season.
Doug Jones, owner of the establishment, said a special Mother's Day brunch menu and wine bottles with fresh flowers were prepared.
"We had about 65 reservations today, totaling about 280 covers for Mother's Day with a special Mother's Day brunch," Jones said. "We can keep some of this food. Hopefully, it's short enough where we don't have to throw a lot of it away. We do a lot of most of our stuff here is all fresh, and so unfortunately, there's a limited shelf life to that," he said.
According to Jones, just one day of lost revenue is going to cost the restaurant thousands of dollars.
"That's probably $10,000 to $12,000 in revenue that's lost. And it's also, unfortunately, 18 to 20 employees that we had scheduled that are counting on the hours and the tips and a big day for them too," he said.
A nearby ice cream shop, Cookies and Cream, is a seasonal small business.
"When you're just opening for the season, you're putting a lot of cash out, buying product to sell. So the bills are rolling in, but the revenue hasn't quite, you know, it's not super busy yet," Alaina Campbell, owner of Cookies and Cream, said.
With Mother's Day and beautiful weather anticipated, that would have changed things.
"We had a lot of staff scheduled for today, especially, yes, with the sun out today, we would have been extremely busy after lunch and then after dinner tonight," Campbell said.
It's not just restaurants and ice cream shops impacted. Hair salons that rely on water for services like hair coloring are also closed for the foreseeable future.
"Hair color being rinsed, and then toning, and then being rinsed and then you're at the shampoo bowl almost 20 minutes," Jessica Yun, owner of Self Salon and Aesthetics, said.
The Lake Orion-based salon is working on a contingency plan to offer limited services for customers.
"They have weddings, they have proms, they have huge events in their lives that we are trying to figure out how to accommodate," Yun said. "We will do things like dry cuts or pretty much anything that doesn't include water."
Each of the businesses is trying to find ways to open in the coming days so that they don't lose so much money. They're asking people to show support and shop local once the repair is completed.