Bhubaneswar: The opening up salons and beauty parlours after prolonged restrictions due to the lockdown came as a huge relief both to the owners and customers.
It may be noted that this was one of the major relaxations announced by the Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC) on Tuesday. Despite clear instructions of social distancing, every parlour and salon in the city has a sizable number of people waiting in queues.
“We have opened our facility after more than two months. No doubt, business has suffered and it will take a lot of time to recover in view of the social distancing norms that we have to follow. We are allowing three customers at a time and are requesting others not to sit in the waiting area,” said a salon manager.
Opening with new measures also means new investment for salon owners in terms of sanitisers, masks, gloves and aprons etc both for the staff and customers.
A salon owner said he has bought nearly a 100 use-and-throw aprons and gloves. We are giving services to only those customers who come to our salon wearing a mask. Exceptions will be made in case of beard grooming or facial treatments, he said.
The long road to recovery is certainly not going to be easy. For one, the salons and beauty parlours were shut bang in the middle to the wedding season. Many parlours had to return the pre-booking amount while also incurring a loss on the expensive products that had been bought and add to that the monthly rentals and the salaries of the staff.
Now, they are grappling with limited staff since many of them returned to their hometowns and those who are in the city, cannot commute due to limited transport facilities. Above all this, they can take a limited number of customers only.
