By Tyler Wright
With a roof collapse damaging part of the kitchen preparation area and part of the female toilets, along with damage to a private dining area, The Independent in Gembrook is one of the businesses hit with heavy rain due to weather in the past weeks.
“It’s annoying because with everything that we’ve been going through, [it’s] another problem that have to tackle another thing that we have to do,” chef and one of the restaurant’s owners Mauro Callegari said.
“In the private dining room we have to wait until they do an assessment to see if there is any damage…we have to make sure the plaster is not about to fall down.
“Everything seems to be moving very quickly, so hopefully in the next couple of weeks we’ll have it all sorted and we can utilise the back room again and the kitchen area and the toilets.”
While there is no figure Mr Callegari could provide on the cost of the repairs, he said the weather has cost The Independent thousands of dollars through cancelled reservations, with around 45 reservations cancelled on one recent Friday night.
“Definitely a good three, four or five thousand dollars that you don’t take on revenue, and then weeks after it’s the same story because the storms continue,” Mr Callegari said.
“You try to manage everything as much as you can, and control your viable costings as much as you can; cancelling staff, sending people home early, giving them a longer break… it affects not only us, it affects everyone.”
The climate outlook up to January suggests this three-month period will be “wetter than average,” BOM meteorologist Hannah Marsh said.
“It looks like a high pressure system will move in on Wednesday [16 November], but it’s looking like that shower activity should ease and clear as we start heading towards the second half of the week” she said.
Mr Callegari said he will continue monitoring the forecast in coming weeks.
“I’m hoping it won’t get as bad as it was,” he said.
