'Barely Anything Left To Hold On To': Hair Salon Owner Shuts Doors Permanently After 13 Years
SANTA CLARITA (CBSLA) -- It's a sad sign of the times.
While local businesses try to survive the coronavirus pandemic with mandatory closures and social distancing restrictions, there are some business owners like Garrett Markenson who have simply run out of options. He just closed his hair salon for good.
"It was really hard," he said. "There's so much ego that had to be let go of and having your name on the door and having created culture for 13 years."
Markenson said his salon has thrived since opening in Santa Clarita in 2008. But over the past few months, he realized his business was no longer sustainable.
"There was no rent relief or reasonable communication from our landlord," he said. "The final straw was after getting shut down the second time, we had several hair dressers quit. There was barely anything left to hold onto."
New data from Yelp shows that as of mid-July, 55% of the 132,500 businesses on their platform that were marked "temporarily closed" are now "permanently closed."
The largest number of closures are in states with the highest number of COVID-19 cases, like California.
"I think we all deserve a little bit more mindfulness when it comes to our businesses and our dreams of everything we've worked so hard for," Markenson said.
According to Yelp, restaurants and retail are the most-closed businesses nationwide. That's followed by the beauty, nightlife and fitness sectors, which experts say are especially hit hard because of the social distancing measures required to reopen.
"I think if they had a think tank with several different hairdressers and included us in some of these decisions, there's could've been a better solution," Markenson said.
Researchers say over the coming months, many business owners who are temporarily shut down will face expiring leases. Like Markenson, they'll have to decide whether to commit to paying rent with with no end in sight to this virus. Markenson decided to close his doors permanently, but he says this is not the end of his career.
"I've been just trying to move out what I can and to continue to do what I know how to do to provide for my family and look towards what's next," he said.
