Fortune Telling Businesses Booming During Pandemic: 'People Want To Have Some Hope'
(CBSDFW.COM) - Many businesses have been closing due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but fortune tellers appear to be doing quite well.
So why are more and more people turning to psychics during this health crisis? In a world of uncertainties, people are looking for predictability.
"With the covid and everything, I was stuck in a bubble," McKinney resident Premila Patel said. She finds that predictability at SoulTopia.
And she's not the only one who is looking for assurance.
The New York Times recently highlighted increased online traffic for horoscope and psychic consultations. Astrologers and tarot card readers have also reported an increased demand in their services.
"Since the pandemic, it's just been an explosive amount of people coming in our stores and also through Zoom and on online and also on the phone," Michelle Welch said.
Welch said her business has gone up over 70% since the beginning of the pandemic.
"It's a broad, broad variety of reasons but it starts primarily with the uncertainty, but then also the fact that people are at home a lot so that creates some issues when we're at home and we're with our family a lot," Welch said. "And then the uncertainty with jobs. And then people that are just maybe, unfortunately, going over in that despair."
Welch said she's seeing more young people come in for readings and that they are also attracted to products like incenses, crystals and stones, which they believe will cleanse their space and ward off negativity.
"We sold a pallet of sage in the last two weeks," Welch said. "And so that and crystals and it's all for like things that we feel like there's this negativity."
Patel told CBS 11 News she's had to readjust her life due to the pandemic.
"I feel that people want to have some hope," Patel said. "It's like being forewarned, you know something is happening and it helps you prepare for it."
With the future filled with uncertainties, both Patel and Welch say people are simply looking for comfort, company and a spiritual connection.
