Local retail industry prepares for massive hit as Tamworth region enters lockdown

As of 5pm yesterday afternoon, the Tamworth local government area was plunged into lockdown, with people asked to only leave their homes for essential reasons.

This has come as a massive blow to retailers around the region, who have to once again change the way they operate, if they're allowed to even open at all.

One business that will be tweaking its operations is Gusto cafe on Peel Street, which according to manager Chloe Morris, has been preparing for this day for quite some time.

"We started preparing when we heard there was a massive outbreak in Sydney, which was weeks ago," she said.

"When we heard there may have been a COVID case in Tamworth on Saturday, we immediately went to all takeaway, and we put extra effort into sanitising the seats, sanitising the tables and we're wearing gloves."

While Ms Morris was hoping the lockdown would never come, she said it important to prepare for the worst.

However, she admitted there's only so much that can be done to get ready for such a major blow to revenue.

"As long as it's short and sweet I think lot of businesses will be able to bounce back, we've been preparing for it, we haven't been going out and buying any major upgrades or anything like that," she said.

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"We've just been saving our money when we've been having good days, because we knew a bad day was going to come, as they say you save money for a rainy day and that rainy day obviously has come this week."

She said even with the changes, and significant support from the cafe's customers, it would be difficult to sustain the efforts beyond one or two weeks before having to look at what support services are available.

Tamworth Business Chamber president Stephanie Cameron said it was good to see some businesses have been able to prepare for the challenge, but not everyone was that fortunate.

"I think you'll find a lot of people have tried to do their best to put away a contingency fund, but for a lot of business that have done it tough over the last 12 months, I'd imagine that might not have been an option," she said.

"So for all of those business that have been able to put a nest egg away, after having been through it once businesses are aware of what could potentially happen again so I'm sure a lot of businesses have put plans in place.

"But whether they've been able to fully resource those plans probably depends on how well they made it through last time."

Ms Cameron said she fears most for the tourism, retail, hospitality, entertainment and education industries, but said the severity of this latest lockdown will depend on whether it can be kept to one week or not.

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