Murray County businesses cautious about reopening

Business, Community
murray county
murray businesses cautious

Southern Munch.
1422 Green Rd.
Chatsworth, will continue to offer to-go orders because their dining room is so small.

Several Murray County businesses have made the decision to remain closed after Governor Brian Kemp eased restrictions on businesses amid the Coronavirus pandemic. It comes down to how meeting guidelines the government provided and how their businesses provide services, they said.

Read about Kemp’s decision to reopen Georgia here.

For Thadd Trammell, owner, operator,and sometimes janitor of the popular eatery Southern Munch, it wasn’t a hard decision.

“We have such a small dining area that if we had one party of six come in, we couldn’t sit anyone else,” he said. “It just makes sense to stick to take out and drive through right now.”

The restaurant is open from 11-3 Tuesday through Friday, and Sunday from 12-3. They do offer dinner hours on Thursday and Friday.

“I’d rather be safe than sorry, so we’re playing it by ear,” said Trammell. For take out information, visit Southern Munch here.

For Wes O’Dell, owner of J&W Sports Apparel in Chatsworth, the pandemic forced him to change what he was doing and it made his businesses more

murray county businesses cautious

J and W Sports Apparel, 4260 Hwy. 76, Chatsworth started offering sports themed masks to help their business during the pandemic.

recognizable.

“I’ve been here for more than a year and people didn’t know it,” he said. “I started offering masks with replaceable filters and now people know me.”

Those masks are made with team affiliations, from high school through professional level.

Still, he has big plans for when stores are allowed to re-open. Prior to the shut down, J&W Sports Apparel was making a name for itself by bringing in professional athletes for autographs and food from Southern Munch. Some names include former Braves closer John Rocker, Otis Nixon, and others. For more information on who is coming next and online ordering, visit J&W’s Facebook page here.

“This virus tried to beat us done, we’re going to beat it,” said O’Dell.

murray county cautious

Robert Leamon, owner and lead instructor at Christ Center Martial Arts, holds a board for student Rebecca Johnson. He has opted to remain closed until more guidelines are eased. CCMA has a dojo at Holly Creek Baptist Church and has a dojo in Dalton.

For Robert Leamon, owner of Christ Centered Martial Arts, which has dojos in Dalton and Chatsworth, the excitement that they could re-open was quickly replaced by the challenge of the guidelines.

“Because of how much room we have and how many students we have, it just wouldn’t be right to only have a select few attend in order to meet the six-feet apart guidelines,” he said. The dojos have a combined membership of about 170 and classes sometimes have 20-30 students of all ages.

“Because of the social distance, wearing masks, gloves, and screening everyone that comes in, it would make it very hard, if not impossible to have martial arts classes,” he continued.

He said his phone started blowing up with students asking about coming back to class after Kemp’s speech and he was all for it until he prayed about it and felt now wasn’t the time. Since temporarily closing, he’s has posted some class work on Facebook and is allowing students to keep track of what they are doing for class credit. Visit their page here.

“At first, we asked them to video what they were doing, but we were getting too many videos, so now it’s on the honor system,” he said. “Not every business is the same, so what works for one may not work for the other.”

 

 

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