Restaurants Reopening - 5/8/20

Yesterday was the first time in more than a month that customers were allowed to dine inside a restaurant.

Intro yesterday was the first time in more than a month that customers were allowed to dine inside a restaurant.// governor tate reeves announced earlier this week restaurants can operate at 50 percent capacity... our quentin smith visited a few eateries to see how things went the first day.// pkg it's another busy day at oby's in starkville..

But instead of only doing curbside orders... they're now serving customers like anderson crechale who couldn't wait to come eat at his favorite restaurant.

" i was not skeptical at all.

I was excited to be able to come out and enjoy my food in a restaurant and sit with my friend."

"i got a shrimp po'boy and a chili and cheese spud."

Lakoury hammond joined crechale for the meal.

The two say they missed being able to enjoy dining inside a restaurant....and they're definitely taking in more than just their food.

" just being able to come in and sit down with friends and be able to eat and talk at a table with friends."

"i mean it's been great just like it used to be before quarantine."

" my kitchen, the first couple of orders they did, they made for here orders to go just because that's all they've been doing the last eight weeks so i had to get them used to it again."

Restaurant owner ayers spencer says they were ready tond serve customers on the inside.

While they saw a slim, but steady flow of patrons on the first day, he expects the crowd to soon grow even bigger.... " when we open the doors at 10:30, we did have a group of two that were ready to come on in, i think.

I think some people are finally ready to get out of the house you know after being cooped up for the last eight weeks."

Also happy to have customers back inside is 1883 smokehouse... " oh we need the cash flow.

We're all small businesses.

We're not a big corporation like sonic or wendy's, where a mom and pop so we need all we can get."

Owner mark welch says the turnout on the first day was better then he imagined.

The smokehouse, just like many other restaurants, has implemented new safety measures, such as moving tables six feet apart, and requiring employees to wear face masks.

"now we're taking emphasis for everybody to get sanitized before they come into the building.

As you can see from the stuff on the front door, we have some questions we ask our customers, so that's a different thing, but that's a good thing.

We can relate our tag although restaurants were given the go-ahead to open dining areas yesterday ..

Many chose not to do so... instead they're going to wait until next week before opening up.// both oby's and 1883 steakhouse will continue to have the curbside option available for customers...for those who still