Alert level 2: Retail, malls, cafes, restaurants, cinema and other public spaces can reopen this Thursday. Schools will reopen on May 18 and bars on May 21.
No one could be happier about the Covid-19 Level 2 green light than Foundation gastropub owner Paul Gibson - even if "it's like running with your legs tied together".
The only restaurant-bar at Te Awa at The Base, the sprawling shopping mecca at Te Rapa in Hamilton, Foundation will openits doors at 10am on Thursday with Gibson knowing it won't be making any money during level 2.
The 400-seater business will be operating at 25-30 per cent of its capacity because of the 100-person level 2 limit and the logistics are hard to get the head around, but for Gibson it's a vital step on the way to level 1 so he can live with it.
By taking the Covid-19 wage subsidy, Gibson's managed to keep on all 35 of his staff - 20 of whom are full-timers - but when this support runs out at the end of June it will be crunch time for decisions over his workforce, he said.
"We want to be in level 1 by mid-June. We are okay at the moment but we don't want to go into August like this that's for sure."
Meanwhile, the business is busy ordering in provisions for a new 70-item winter menu which was due to be introduced more than a month ago, and working out how to organise staff around the need for fewer chefs in the kitchen, and the one-server-to-a-table rule.
"We will try to spread hours to keep chefs. It's a bit of a logistics nightmare. The one server is an issue as well, because that person has to take the food order, take the drinks order, take it all to the table.
"We will have someone on the door counting heads and once we're full, we're full. We're in a shopping mall so we get a lot of foot traffic. When we have 100 people, we'll just have to turn people away.
"We'll take phone numbers and we can call or text them when we have room for them."
The nine-year-old gastropub also has to set up for contact tracing. It has to record details for every guest.
Foundation owners Claire and Paul Gibson. Photo / Supplied
Gibson's working on securing technology for that.
"If the worst comes to the worst, it'll be a piece of paper and a clipboard."
The shutdown will have lost Gibson and his wife Claire close to $200,000 by the time they open again. Ten staff who earned more than $1000 a week have taken a big pay cut, he said.
But the couple have paid their bills, haven't deferred any due payments or taken a mortgage holiday.
"We've paid our provisional taxes and GST and we're still paying PAYE. We've paid all our bills so we're pretty much starting from scratch."
They paid April's rent bill of $37,000 on time and are negotiating with The Base manager and half-owner Kiwi Property on a rent concession for level 2, Gibson said.
Tainui Group Holdings, the commercial development arm of Waikato-Tainui, owns the other half.
The rent was the spectre that hung heaviest over the Gibsons at the start of the lockdown on March 25.
They still had 18 months to run on their 10-year lease.
If the lockdown dragged on and the business fell over, Foundation would still have been required to pay its lease and the couple would have been bankrupt, Gibson said.
Foundation gastropub seats 400 at Te Awa at The Base, Te Rapa. Photo / Supplied
Twenty years of hard work in the tough hospitality industry would've been lost.
But the sun came out with Monday's 4pm government announcement and Gibson said the business is raring to go again.
Despite some speculation that people will be cautious about dining out again and returning to busy places, Gibson has no doubt at all that Foundation will be busy.
"People are going to want to get out and about. And we're in a shopping mall with movies, there's a lot of traffic."
There have been valuable lessons.
"Reduce debt - have as little debt as possible. Have surplus money for a rainy day.
"We've found we are quite resilient but it's a matter of when times are good putting money away for bad times."
The support of staff and regular customers has been "amazing", Gibson said.
Customers have sent messages and bought $4000 of vouchers through a website set up to help the hospitality sector.
"We're [feeling] pretty good, We're ready to go, ready to get the doors open. That's our focus now. The unknown was the worst thing."
