The Point gives the word to bosses, employees, artisans… who work in the sectors most affected by the crisis of the Covid-19. Will they be able to overcome it ? Will they need to change lane, launching a new career ? The France of 2020 will experience a profound transformation.
” I started to feel that something was wrong in February. I was then in Tucson, the United States, to a large gathering of professionals from the minerals, with 6,000 vendors around the world. However, there was very little of Chinese, a lot less than usual. And then I come back to Paris, the 14 February, and things start to get tougher, with the first cases of Covid in Italy, then in france. Curiously, however, the month of February has been the best the company has ever made. I therefore say : all is well ! But a few days later, the clients become more scarce, the business began to decline, and on Sunday, march 15, it is the closure. Therefore, we stop everything.
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of Course, at the beginning, we don’t really know what to do. I don’t have a problem with my product, because the minerals are not perishable ! But I told my employees to stay home, and the book, very quickly, explained to me that one could apply the scheme of partial unemployment. The system is very efficient, we completed the part of the salary that the State does not support. On the other hand, my employees who performed overtime, four hours per week, have lost their income from those hours. I have not been able to financially compensate for this loss, because the cash is limited, and that the future was, at the beginning of the containment, very uncertain.
The report of the expenses we had as well helped, but I find that there is a lot of blur. We talk about exemption in the future, but we do not know more for the moment. I’ve just set what I needed, I may be refunded later, I expect to learn more. We have also requested the landlord the possibility of reducing the rent. I pay one of my store in the gallery of the Carrousel on a quarterly basis, and the deadline was April. The lessor, immediately, I was offered to pay month by month, which has relieved my cash. He also told me that it would exempt a quarter of all the companies that carry out fewer than a million sales, which is our case. I have not yet received confirmation, but I remain optimistic !
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My goal now is to keep the cash. So I frozen my orders of stone, waiting to see if the activity will resume. I have lost, since the beginning of the crisis, at least 25 % of my turnover, which is considerable. I was able to re-open the store on the 11th of June, I regret that we did not have masks and gel earlier, it would have helped anticipate the opening of shops and, therefore, to revive more quickly in our business. The problem is that there are only two shops open in the gallery. This is a little ridiculous. The Louvre museum is always closed, that night, obviously, the attendance in shops. I don’t know of anything that will give the future. I wait, I have no choice. “
writing will advise you
” I put my restaurant sale “
