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As more people are getting vaccinated and restrictions continue to be lifted, people are going out and getting back to “normal” life. That means they aren’t longer shopping solely online or picking up food or having it delivered.

While we are finally getting the chance to go back outside and experience life as we did before March 2020, businesses are still struggling to get back to a sense of normalcy. The days of fully-staffed restaurants have seemingly disappeared as they are struggling to find workers. Other businesses are hurting too.

As you drive around town, you notice most businesses have a “help wanted” sign somewhere in a window or out front. The lack of workers is slowing down the rate of service we came to expect before the world shut down.

While annoying to us as a customer, it is equally frustrating to employers and the employees who are currently working. Instead of having their normal shifts, workers are having to pull double shifts, working longer hours and more days than they originally expected.

Smaller staffs worked when we couldn’t go to our favorite spot and enjoy a long lunch or go to our favorite outlet store to waste some time. Now that people are out and about again, stores and restaurants are understaffed but working at normal capacity.

As customers, we always want our food in a timely manner and hate waiting in line at a checkout.

However, it is important to remember that the number of workers hasn’t gotten back to normal. The waiter at your table might have twice as many tables as they did 16 months ago. Instead of having five chefs, some restaurants might be down to just one or two.

We encourage you to remain patient as you sit down at your favorite restaurant. Remember that it wasn’t that long ago that you couldn’t even sit down at that restaurant due to COVID-19 restrictions.

While we are slowly getting back to “normal,” not everything is progressing as quickly as we’d like. Have patience at stores and restaurants until we get there.