By Sophia Marcheli and Mia Reede
With the city’s mask mandate lifted, businesses, restaurants and galleries along Trade Street in the Arts District in Downtown Winston-Salem are coming back to life, with the exception of a small number that could not weather the lost business of the past two years.
After Forsyth County’s initial stay-at-home order went into place on April 14, 2020, many businesses across the Arts District were forced to temporarily shut down until further notice. While they were then allowed to start opening back up with restrictions in August 2020, all was not back to normal with the mask mandate still in place. In March 2022, City of Winston-Salem Mayor Allen Joines officially lifted the mask mandate and since then, businesses are starting to achieve normalcy again.
“We’ve done well,” shop-owner of The B-String guitar store and avid guitarist Michael Bennett said proudly while sitting behind his pick covered and guitar laden desk. He said that their experience was unique in comparison to other restaurants and businesses because their level of business continued to increase.“We were sort of the opposite of everything,” he said.
In spite of closing for 10 weeks during the height of the pandemic, they still had “a record year” in terms of sales and revenue. He linked their increase in sales not just to “good business and good customers” but that many people were forced to self-reflect, and had time to rediscover old hobbies.
“People who hadn’t played for 20 to 30 years now wanted to buy guitars,” Bennett said. Despite not having an online shop that stayed up-to-date with their inventory, they were still successful and their shipments increased five-fold. When asked if he ever thought of transitioning to a fully online store, Bennett joked that “online stuff was too complicated.”
Bennett’s store has continued to thrive and celebrated its fifteenth year anniversary the week of April 16.
Major Tomms Oddities and Vintage shop was forced to shut down temporarily too during the early months of the pandemic however they are open again and back to normal. Molly Southern, who began working at the shop in September 2019, explained that during the pandemic, the shop moved its inventory to social media platforms to sell and maintain connection with customers. Now that the mask mandate has been lifted and stores are beginning to function like usual, people are coming back into the shop.
“It has picked up shockingly well. It’s clear that as soon as people could come out they did and they were excited,” said Southern.
Another business on Trade Street directly affected by the pandemic is the yoga studio and cafe, Wildlight Wellness Collective. Jeremy Grace, the center’s founder, said that after businesses were allowed to re-open in August, 2020, he moved many of his classes outdoors and lowered prices.
“I lowered my prices to a very low-key area to help keep people who had lost jobs or anything else, which negatively impacted me financially but we stayed open,” said Grace. Within the past months he has raised his class prices back to what they were pre-pandemic. Grace also noted that he received no financial help from the government.
The B-String guitar shop also declined government assistance, and refused to even finish filling out the forms. Although they were struggling, so was the rest of the community, Bennett recognized. “We were not struggling enough,” he said, and wanted the funds to go to neighboring establishments in greater need.
The art galleries and studios in the district were also directly impacted by COVID-19. Many artists were dropping out of shows or not providing new works and people from the community were also unable to keep up with attendance at the gallery’s shows despite still having exhibits at the time.
Marsha McNeely, who now collaborates and works with the Studio 7 art gallery on Trade Street was directly affected during Covid-19 as she was forced to close her own gallery, the McNeely Gallery, on 6th street near the restaurant 6th and Vine.
“It was a big space that they’ve now divided into two separate places. I had seven working studios and then a gallery upstairs,” said McNeely. “After Covid, because people (artists) were dropping out and nobody could come, I ended up closing in October 2020.”
McNeely now has her own, smaller space, within Studio 7 where she showcases art pieces; however, she said it’s now more of a small shop rather than a gallery, yet this was the only way she could keep it open.
“I think that’s what most of us have had to do, is adapt,” said McNeely. However, she was optimistic when she noted that in the past 6 months business has picked up and she has noticed a steady increase in people’s attendance not only to Studio 7, but to the arts district overall.
