Before Anthony's Good Food Market in West Point reopened in May after a closure of more than six weeks, owner Ray Hamilton had a message for his 34 employees.
"If you want to come back, come back, and we'll figure it out from there,'" he told them.
After being closed for so long because of the COVID-19 pandemic, Anthony's likely wouldn't get very many of its employees to return, Hamilton assumed. He braced himself for the troubles that would come with training a reduced staff or having to hire brand-new workers.
"To have new people who had never been in here before and knew how we already did things, oh, it would have been a nightmare," Hamilton said. "I probably would have stayed closed or just limited to just to-go."
But to his surprise, 80 percent of his employees returned to work, assuaging Hamilton's concerns that their ability to draw federal and state unemployment insurance and their worries about being exposed to the virus at work might mean a lot of them never made it back.
"It's just a matter of respect," Hamilton said. "They understand what we're trying to do here in wanting to keep that level of excellence up."
Anthony's has been one of the area restaurants to retain a majority of its staff. So is Zachary's in Columbus, which brought back all but a few of 60 workers.
But many of the restaurant employees who returned to work felt like they had no other choice, according to a bartender at an upscale restaurant in downtown Columbus who asked to remain anonymous out of job security concerns.
She said she's not a fan of dine-in service at her own workplace or anywhere -- she avoids going out to eat on her days off -- but doesn't have much of an option if she wants to continue drawing a paycheck. Almost all her friends and coworkers feel the same way, she said.
"I can't afford not to come to work," she said. "My hands are kind of tied."
'Ready to get out'
Manager Samantha Till Walls, a student at Mississippi State, was one of Anthony's returning employees. She has been working for the restaurant for five years and managing for three, and with no other jobs during the pandemic, she decided to come back.
During the closure, Walls said, she and the restaurant's other employees filed for unemployment insurance, receiving up to $835 per week in federal and state benefits. The Columbus bartender said an employee at her restaurant was offered her job back after being laid off but held out for another month to keep getting the payments.
"It's more than what we're making now," Walls said.
Things were similar at Zachary's, as owner Doug Pellum simply said "there was no money there" to pay employees during the restaurant's closure of more than five weeks, which began March 20.
But when all three local restaurants received money from the Paycheck Protection Program, part of the CARES Act passed by Congress in March, things started to change.
Zachary's received between $350,000 and $1 million, and Pellum could pay his workers again. The few who didn't return including a 70-year-old who didn't feel safe, an employee who was six months pregnant and several Mississippi University for Women who went back to their hometowns when the school shut down.
As for the rest?
They "were ready to get out and get back to making money," Pellum said. "Being shut down for five weeks hurt them in their wallets."
Hamilton said the money Anthony's received (less than $150,000) was "instrumental" in retaining his staff and allowed the restaurant to operate with more workers on shift once it reopened.
Otherwise, he said, "I would have run way more of a skeleton crew, and it probably would have hurt our reputation and not allowed us to get back going as quick as we did."
But Jay Yates, owner of The Veranda in Starkville, said just 15 of the 60 people the restaurant employed prior to the pandemic are currently working -- less than he expected.
"Some people are just not here in town anymore," Yates said. "Some people are worried about being exposed. Some people just kind of disappeared."
About mid-June, several employees became sick, so Yates closed the restaurant for roughly two weeks, through Fourth of July weekend, and had his employees tested for COVID-19. Though no one tested positive, The Veranda lost a few Mississippi State student employees before it reopened for the second time.
Yates said operating with a smaller staff is more difficult, mostly because it's a mode of business he isn't used to -- one with too much opportunity for error.
"We're used to being busy all the time," he said. "In my experience -- I've been doing this for over 35 years -- it's much harder to run a slow business than it is one that's very busy. You might be busy all of a sudden and not have enough people, or you might just kind of get lulled to sleep and start making mistakes."
'It puts everybody at risk'
At the Columbus bartender's restaurant, 10 barstools have been cut down to six and six tables turned to three in order to maintain no more than 50-percent capacity in the dining room. Regardless, the bartender's regular customers still come once a week as always, one of the things she cherishes.
"I love my job, and I really enjoy working with the people that I work with," she said. "That's probably the only thing that really brings me back down to earth and makes it a little bit easier to come into work."
But her concerns remain amid a spike in COVID-19 cases in the state, including a one-day record 1,635 new confirmed cases by the Mississippi State Department of Health on Tuesday morning.
The bartender, who transitioned to helping prepare and hand out curbside takeout orders when her restaurant's dine-in services were ordered halted, said she wishes the company that owns her restaurant "would take it upon themselves to shut down without being told to by the state."
She considers herself "jealous" of the other area restaurants that have yet to reopen their dining rooms.
"To me, it looks like we don't care about the community's safety, but that's just my opinion," she said.
She said a safe return to indoor dining will necessitate government leaders putting their foot down to re-close dining rooms so everyone is "on the same page."
"That's the only way this is going to get better: if people will just do what they're supposed to do," she said. "If they have to be told to do what they're supposed to do, then so be it. A lot of people aren't doing it on their own, and that's just dangerous."
So far, those local restaurants that have reopened indoor dining are taking any available measures to limit the spread.
Pellum said Zachary's uses chemicals certified to kill COVID-19, and all his employees wear masks and gloves to keep themselves and customers safe.
"We're doing everything we possibly can to protect them," Pellum said.
Similar measures are in place at Anthony's, which has taken away reusable salt and pepper shakers and turned to disposable paper menus, aiming to get rid of anything diners routinely touch. Staffers now have one station to themselves rather than tag-teaming food preparation or moving around the kitchen freely.
"Now, it's more of, 'This is your job today,'" Hamilton said. "'You're in charge of this.'"
Walls and her coworkers are wearing masks, but she said the fact that diners have to take them off to eat and drink is concerning, particularly given the recent spike.
"Not only does it put the servers at risk, it puts everybody at risk," Walls said.
Consequently, many area residents are still avoiding dining out for the time being.
Things are "in flux" at The Veranda, according to Yates; at Zachary's, takeout orders currently account for 50 percent of food sales, though Pellum said the fact that the restaurant is at 50-percent seating capacity factors in.
"There are a lot of people that still won't go out to eat," Pellum said.
He said overall sales at Zachary's are down a little from pre-pandemic numbers, but things are pretty close to normal.
"We're very happy and surprised with what we are getting," Pellum said.
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