Business Lost During Outage, but Not Perspective

Last week's outage cost the  $20,000 in business, $10,000 in spoiled food and $8,000 in tips and wages to employees.

“Our servers couldn't make their livelihood," said John Klager, the restaurant's general manager. “Most live hand to mouth. They have loans to pay, so this really cuts into their lifestyle.”

Inyo closed Wednesday night after an electricity outage and stayed closed until Sunday, despite the power returning to the area Saturday. Klager said the restaurant's fish and food stock was spoiled, so staff spent Saturday restocking.

Klager said this is especially bad for a local nonfranchise business. He said restaurants such as his have slimmer profit margins than chain eateries, making the loss in profit all the more painful.

"It is water over the dam," Klager said. "You just can't get it back."

There is some hope, though. Klager is speaking with his insurance company about recuperating some of the losses, but he is not betting that it will solve his woes. 

Inyo is just one of many Ferndale businesses hurt by the heat wave power outage, which saw about 6,000 DTE Energy customers without power at its peak. Most service industry businesses such as restaurants, bars, spas and the like cannot make up for lost time. Many, like Inyo, lost inventory and/or had to shell out extra money for ice or a generator to keep bad from going to worse.

Several blocks up Woodward, Cheryl Salinas-Tucker, co-owner of , shut down her salon Thursday and Friday and spent the time calling clients to reschedule appointments that had been booked weeks in advance. Salinas-Tucker felt especially bad for her clients, as the shop has become very in demand since a LivingSocial.com coupon deal for which some customers have taken time off work to get a pedicure.

As for any chance of minimizing the loss from DTE Energy, she said it isn't worth pursuing. "I have heard DTE is doing a $25 rebate," she said. "But that is not going to cover the thousand dollars I had lost by not being in for a few days."

Some businesses were more fortunate. Chris Best, co-owner of on the corner of Nine Mile and Woodward Avenue, runs exclusively on weekends, so his business was not affected by the Wednesday night blackout that lasted until Saturday.

By last Friday, after two days of no power and rumors that the outage would last until Sunday, he emailed the 70 vendors who comprise the market and canceled. He contacted his insurance agent and said he was looking at a $6,000 loss for the day. However, he was wakened Saturday morning by a call from a vendor, informing him that power had been restored. Best reached many of the vendors in time to prepare to open Saturday. He is relieved to say the outage's impact on his business is “nil.”

Even though Salinas-Tucker and Klager lost serious money, neither is fretting. 

"You just have to roll with it," Salinas-Tucker said. "We don't have any control."

Klager said that although he isn't satisfied with how the power outage was handled, his three years serving in the Vietnam War helps him put the daily disappointments of the restaurant industry into perspective. 

"This is nothing," he said. "Granted, you don't want to take a loss, but nobody lost a leg."

Correction: In a previous version of this story Cheryl Salinas-Tucker was improperly identified. This version of the story corrects that error.