Hospitality crisis forces Gylly Beach Café to close two days a week
One of Cornwall's most popular restaurants has been forced to close two days a week following a staffing crisis in the West Country's hospitality industry.
The hospitality sector has seen a lack of trained staff and professionals returning to the industry after the Covid lockdown.
The Gylly Beach Café in Falmouth is one of many restaurants and pubs in Cornwall affected by the shortage.
The team took to social media to announce the closures, saying they have "exhausted many other avenues" before being "forced to make the extreme decision of closing the café every Monday and Tuesday for the foreseeable future".
The business is not the only restaurant suffering from a lack of staff, as people have decided not to return to hospitality after being furloughed.
More than 350,000 jobs were lost in the hospitality industry across Britain over the past year and more than 350 jobs are currently being advertised on caterer.com in Cornwall alone.
One harbourside eatery in Fowery said this week that it was struggling to find staff and the renowned Pandora Inn, between Truro and Falmouth, took the difficult decision to reduce its serving times.
The historic riverside pub at Restronguet also stated last week: “Sadly due to the current crisis in recruitment across the hospitality industry in general, we have had to make the hard decision to reduce the days and times when we can serve food - not something we want to do but it is something we have to do to protect our fabulous team."
As Cornwall's hospitality trade prepared to reopen last month, many businesses were struggling to recruit.
'Recruitment is a challenge'
Michael Caines, who has two restaurants in Cornwall, revealed how his hotel and restaurant businesses are struggling to take on new staff, calling recruitment “a challenge”.
Caines - who has restaurants in Maenporth in Falmouth and Porthleven - spoke about how he was trying to hire 20 people across his hotel and restaurant group, saying: “We’re desperately trying to recruit enough staff.”
He added: "Without question, recruitment is a challenge. All of the businesses are extremely busy. For the next three, four months our hotel is completely booked up."
The 52-year-old chef, who was born in Devon, said he feels a lot of people are concerned about leaving a job where they qualify for furlough, to take a new job where they wouldn't qualify if there was another lockdown.
He said: “There's a bit of nervousness from an employee's point of view."
He hopes vacancies will be more easily filled when students break up from college and university and start looking for summer work across the country.
'Negative stigma'
The team behind The Longstore in Charlestown, The Sharksfin in Mevagissey and The Golden Lion in Port Isaac have also spoken of similar struggles, having recently introduced new company incentives to try and entice more people into the industry.
The company had not seen a single applicant for some chef jobs, and some of the adverts were not even getting clicks.
It came as The Pollocks Pub Co's latest venture in Truro, The Longstore Lemon Street, opened last month - replacing Bustopher Jones.
Brandon Tregidgo, the executive manager for the company, said it was desperately trying to recruit chefs especially but also seeking to fill front-of-house roles.
He thinks some people are being put off by the "negative stigma" of hospitality work which Pollocks Pub Co is “trying to abolish" by putting an end to "the traditional chef culture” of long and unsociable hours.
Instead the company wants to promote a healthy work-life balance, but he thinks people might now be put off the industry altogether after a lengthy time on furlough because of the coronavirus.
He said: "I think it's a combination of factors as to why this is happening," he explained. "It's a bit of a culture shift and people have been on furlough and got used to their evenings off and time off which has maybe made them realise perhaps hospitality isn't quite for them."
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