The Covid-19 Pandemic in New York’s Food Sector: How Small Businesses, Restaurants, and Outdoor Markets Adapted

Abstract

During the Covid-19 pandemic, the food industry in New York was devastated by the public health crisis, accompanied by state-imposed shutdowns, mass unemployment, and broken supply chains. When New Yorkers were allowed to return to work, although under pandemic restrictions, food businesses adapted by offering new services, selling groceries and takeout dishes, and shifting from indoor to outdoor dining. Restaurant workers became entrepreneurs, opening pop-up businesses or selling food to neighbors; many restaurants delivered meals to hospitals and schools. The number of street vendors increased, most working without required permits, and outdoor markets limited their operations. Forced to adapt to the pandemic, the food sector in New York developed both a new temporality and a new spatiality, emphasizing neighborhoods outside the center and expanding the public realm.

Keywords

• Covid-19
• New York food industry
• restaurant industry
• small business
• street vendors