Support for Bonus Round Game Cafe
Donation protected
When we opened Bonus Round two and a half years ago our goal was to create a welcoming community space for friends to gather for a night of fun. We accomplished that goal and a LOT of fun was had! Bonus Round quickly became a self-sustaining business and at the beginning of 2020 we were finally seeing all of our hard work pay off with some strong growth, that all came to a halt in March.
Building a community space was at the core of our business, but because of the nature of this pandemic, that community has all but disappeared.
Once again, this week restaurants across the city have been forced to shut down for indoor dining. Unfortunately for us, this actually will not have as significant an impact as it will for some. We say unfortunately because it was clear (and understandable) that our customer base wasn’t ready to come back to our restaurant. We haven’t gotten anywhere near the amount of business we need to continue to operate since this pandemic started. We’re not alone in this though, restaurants across the city are absolutely struggling. Every week dozens more shut down permanently, many of which were long time fixtures with history much older than ours.
The reality is that loans and grants which were available early on were only meant to last 2-3 months. Bonus Round will not be able to survive this without the support from our community.
If you don’t know, Drew and I worked 4 long and hard years to open Bonus Round. We’ve put a lot of ourselves into this business, but we can’t do this alone. Up until this point we’d been reluctant to ask for help, we’re scrappy punk rockers and always find a way to make things work. Thus far we’ve managed to keep our doors open and we’ve managed to hold onto our staff. That’s no longer a certainty and right now we need help.
Your support will be used to keep the store operational, while continuing to pay our staff as we have been during the pandemic. As a family owned business, the support of our community means everything to us.
Building a community space was at the core of our business, but because of the nature of this pandemic, that community has all but disappeared.
Once again, this week restaurants across the city have been forced to shut down for indoor dining. Unfortunately for us, this actually will not have as significant an impact as it will for some. We say unfortunately because it was clear (and understandable) that our customer base wasn’t ready to come back to our restaurant. We haven’t gotten anywhere near the amount of business we need to continue to operate since this pandemic started. We’re not alone in this though, restaurants across the city are absolutely struggling. Every week dozens more shut down permanently, many of which were long time fixtures with history much older than ours.
The reality is that loans and grants which were available early on were only meant to last 2-3 months. Bonus Round will not be able to survive this without the support from our community.
If you don’t know, Drew and I worked 4 long and hard years to open Bonus Round. We’ve put a lot of ourselves into this business, but we can’t do this alone. Up until this point we’d been reluctant to ask for help, we’re scrappy punk rockers and always find a way to make things work. Thus far we’ve managed to keep our doors open and we’ve managed to hold onto our staff. That’s no longer a certainty and right now we need help.
Your support will be used to keep the store operational, while continuing to pay our staff as we have been during the pandemic. As a family owned business, the support of our community means everything to us.
Organizer
Andrew Lovell
Organizer
Chicago, IL