Small Business Owners Band Together During Time Of Coronavirus

HERNDON, VA — As the Centers for Disease Control began encouraging people to stay at home and practice social distancing last week to stem the spread of the coronavirus, also known as COVID-19, Meg Donnelly began to wonder how this would impact her business.

"I thought right away that my business, which is as a massage therapist, that's hands on someone's body," the Herndon resident said. "So, right away I had the idea, well, that doesn't really fit into that."

Rather than taking her temperature every morning and night, wearing gloves for every appointment and making sure every surface was cleaned and disinfected — something Donnelly does all the time anyway — it made more sense to stop taking appointments in order to ensure everyone's safety.

"As I thought about that, I kind of decided that I'm obviously not the only business that can be affected by this," she said.

Donnelly gets together regularly with a group of local small business owners that are primarily women. One member of the group is Kelly Roth, a Realtor who recently started Glitterbomb Media to produce promotional videos.

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While Roth's video business is unaffected by social distancing, the same can't be said for her other job.

"I have had showings canceled," she said. "People are holding their listings, because people don't want a lot of people coming through their house. I have a listing coming up. Fortunately, it's vacant. I'm going to have Clorox wipes at the door. Shoes covers, you know, and go down each night and wipe it down. That's what I can do."

Realizing many other small business owners in the area might be in the same boat, Donnelly and Roth decided to produce a video public service announcement (PSA) that would remind residents in Herndon, Reston, and Chantilly to support local businesses during these times of social distancing.

The duo reached out to a number of business owners in the area who were all eager to participate. Donnelly wrote a script and each participant recorded a brief video, which they sent to Roth to edit together.

Participants included Liz Kamp of New Trail Cycling Studio; Melissa and Jason Romano of Lake Anne Brew House & Nordic Knot Pretzels; Krissee and Mariano D’Aguiar of River Sea Chocolates; Paul Olsen of Weird Brothers Coffee; Rachel Eisenfeld of Elden Street Tea Shop; Anne and Todd Mader of The Bike Lane and Bike Lane Brewing; and Anna K Gibson of AKG Design Studio.

On Monday morning, Roth posted the video, titled “We are Small Business - Ways To Support Our Local Businesses While Practicing Social Distancing,” on YouTube.

While many people may already know that social distancing is having an impact on small businesses, Donnelly and Roth hope the video demonstrates there are other ways to support them without putting one's self at risk.

"It's really just so that the public can think about new and different ways that they can support us when we can't see them in person," Donnelly said. "A lot of us have unique things like online seminars that we do or gift cards that you can purchase now, so that they can be used later, which for me is wonderful. Gift cards and packages, because that shows me that the community is coming back to me once I reopened."

Roth is going a step further by posting daily messages on social media with the theme, "Each day, how can I support a small business?"

"Today I went and got a cup of coffee," she said. "Yesterday, I went and picked up some cans at a brewery, or I'm going to be buying my Mother's Day gift of a massage from Meg."

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