How COVID-19 has affected Auburn business owners ‘dependent’ on college sports — and fans
It’s a fall Saturday in Auburn, and thousands of fans have descended upon the east Alabama city. The Tigers football team is playing, and many wearing orange and blue have flocked to the town’s various local businesses, many of which heavily rely on the revenue that a normal football season brings.
Customers flood local restaurants and pack shoulder-to-shoulder into popular gameday apparel stores, like J&M Bookstore on 115 South College Street — something they may not be able to do this season due to the coronavirus pandemic.
“It has certainly affected my workforce,” Trey Johnston, owner and CEO of J&M, said over the phone Monday. The store was closed for five weeks due to COVID-19. “And since we’ve opened up, my sales and my customers have not returned yet. People are being cautious. We’re running shorter hours.”
Auburn President Jay Gogue said both fall classes and football will happen on the Plains this year in an admissions greeting video to the university’s incoming freshman class posted May 6. The SEC on May 22 announced that voluntary in-person athletics workouts can begin taking place on June 8.
That’s a positive step toward a college football season, though there remains a lot of moving parts.
Football is one of only two sports at Auburn that made a net profit last fiscal year, the most recent financial report from the university shows, and the program made over $29 million from ticket sales alone. For the town’s local businesses, a football season is arguably more important.
‘Whatever we’ve got to do’
Greg Gulledge, owner of Byron’s Smokehouse on 436 Opelika Road, spoke with Auburn Mayor Ron Anders following the statewide closures.
“Ron, I don’t care what we do,” Gulledge recalled telling the mayor, “whatever we’ve got to do to get football.”
Auburn’s 2020 season opener, Sept. 5 at home against Alcorn State, will likely look much different than in years past due to the novel coronavirus pandemic, and the precautions taken because of it. Auburn’s businesses, from apparel stores to restaurants, will feel its effects.
J&M took online orders during the mandated shutdown, Johnson said, averaging between 15 and 30 orders per day. At its peak, the store had 50 in one day.
Anders Bookstore on 212 West Magnolia Avenue is classified as an essential business since it doubles as a UPS access point, but closed its sales floor during Alabama’s COVID-19 closure of nonessential businesses.
The store saw a jump in online orders, but still suffered following the cancellation of Auburn’s baseball season, spring football including the A-Day scrimmage and the cancellation of all in-person classes at the university until further notice.
“Local businesses in Auburn are a lot more dependent on the university being open than I thought,” Anders Bookstore store manager Charles Snoddy said. “Them closing down campus means that not only students aren’t there, but faculty, which means that they’re not walking around. If the stores weren’t shut down (during the pandemic), I doubt we’d have had any foot traffic, or anywhere near what we normally do.”
What if fans can’t go to games?
Stores like J&M and Anders carry much of the on-field apparel the university’s athletic teams sport on the sidelines, like baseball caps or jerseys.
Anders received a large shipment of spring sports inventory just before the mandated closures, but had trouble getting some of the Under Armour gear from China. That actually turned out to be a blessing in disguise, since the store wouldn’t have been able to sell the items had they arrived on time.
Not having a football season would be “detrimental,” Snoddy said, though he sees the possibility of sales if a season is held and games are televised.
“Apparel stores for the university, they’ll probably still do OK if there’s any kind of season of sports,” Snoddy said. “But it’s the restaurants and stuff that would be the concern.”
This time of the year, according Gulledge, downtown Auburn would be “buzzing.” Graduation would be going on. Baseball season would be in full swing. A-Day was originally scheduled for April 18.
Now, it’s “just not happening,” he said.
Gulledge anticipates things to stay that way until the fall. There’s not much local restaurant owners in a college town can do, aside from “hope like hell that we have football season.”
Jordan-Hare Stadium seats over 87,000 people, about 20,000 more than Auburn’s population. And that’s not counting the fans who attend tailgates and don’t enter the stadium.
Sanjay Choudhury, owner of Wild Wing Cafe restaurants in neighboring Opelika and Columbus, foresees a revenue drop of around 20% should a football season happen without fans. His Opelika store opened for dine-in last week, albeit with social distancing precautions in place.
Even the band on stage must remain six feet apart.
Choudhury said on Friday that a season without fans could still work for restaurants. Since fans aren’t in the stadium, business would be great for sports bars, or restaurants that could show the games on television.
“Now, (the fans) can’t do tailgating,” Choudhury said. “So they have to be somewhere, like in a bar or restaurant.”
