NEWS
Establishments expect increased business during Halloween
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by Darryl Schnell
Monday, September 26, 2005
Halloween weekend in Madison continues to bring thousands of visitors and partygoers to the downtown area each year and impacts the livelihood of a number of State Street eateries and businesses.
According to Jimmy Pashaj, owner of Pizza Di Roma on State Street, every restaurant on State Street can expect a possible 40-to-60 percent increase in business due to the influx of several thousand patrons and partiers downtown.
"That weekend is just so crazy in terms of how busy we are," Pashaj said. "We don't usually have to run all of our ovens. However, that weekend we'll have all four [workers] on all the time, as opposed to two or three."
Daniel Bladl, assistant manager at Chipotle on State Street, said he expects the restaurant to be so busy there will be no breaks in food preparation.
"It's going to have to be a constant flow of cooking," Bladl said. "For example, as soon as we finish cooking some chicken or something, instead of not needing to cook anymore for awhile, we'll have to cook more right away."
Bladl said Chipotle expects close to twice as much business on Halloween compared to normal weekend days, and as a result, the restaurant will require extra staffing. Pashaj said he plans to utilize extra staffing as well.
"Everyone that works here and everyone that has worked here in the past year will be scheduled for Halloween," Pashaj said. "We'll have all that extra staffing, but we'll probably still get bogged down."
University of Wisconsin senior Brad Lewis said a number of restaurants could utilize more resources during Halloween to compensate for the large crowds.
"I bet those restaurants do a lot more business on Halloween," Lewis said, "[P]laces like Ian's and Qdoba always have long lines at bar time, but their lines are huge when there are 60,000 or so people on State Street."
Lewis said he frequents whichever restaurant is on his way home when he leaves the bars on weekends, including such student favorites as Ian's, Pizza Di Roma and Qdoba.
Lewis said he thinks a number of those establishments see improved business on Halloween than restaurants with normal hours.
"Those places stay open that late because drunk people get hungry and they tend to spend tons of money," Lewis said.
Pashaj said Pizza Di Roma remains open until 3 a.m. because business supports it. Staying open late allows some protection of the restaurant on Halloween as well, he added.
"We're not really taking any extra security measures on Halloween," Pashaj said. "However, because we are open quite late, our employees can watch to see if anything happening on State Street could cause damage to our restaurant."
Blandl said there are no plans to change security measures at Chipotle on Halloween either.
"There won't be anyone working here late because we close at 10 p.m.," Blandl said. "However, at this point it doesn't sound like we're doing anything extra for protection."
Pashaj said his restaurant will have security cameras on cash registers, like always, but typically, the riots have not damaged Pizza Di Roma on Halloween.
