2. Catering
A chef preparing dishes for take-away delivery service at a hot pot restaurant in Chongqing on a February day in 2020. [Photo/Xinhua]
The catering industry suffered heavy losses due to nearly all restaurants shutting down. Some parts of the industry were able to adapt: for example, some restaurants sold their food online at low prices. At the same time, waiters were reassigned to do logistics and delivery work. However, the industry's losses are still serious.
"Almost all of our 400 stores were closed due to the epidemic, and we estimated the monthly losses around the Spring Festival would be at around 700 million to 800 million yuan. If the situation continues, our company will not be able to survive in three months," Jia Guolong, chairman and founder of Xibei, a leading restaurant chain, said in an interview, which shows severity situation of the shutdown.
