Before the pandemic, drycleaner Kee Liu would be doing brisk business this time of year at his Best Eclat Dry Cleaners in the Yonge-Davis Centre plaza.
There would be a steady stream of customers dropping off coats to be cleaned after another Canadian winter.
Parents and students would come through the door with formal wear needing to be spruced up in time for graduations and proms.
Wedding parties and their invited guests would take in suits, tuxedos and dresses to get them ready for the big day.
That was on top of the people who brought in their regular dry cleaning.
But now, days go by without Liu making a sale, although sometimes he’s lucky to have a customer or two.
“What I am doing here is sitting here all day just crossing my fingers hopefully someone is going to come in. But sometimes, I sit in here all day, I don’t see nobody,” he Liu, who frets about how he will repay government and bank loans he’s taken to keep his business afloat.
“When you go home and think about what you did today, it makes you feel stressful, awful, actually.”
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In desperation, Liu spray painted a poignant message on the window of his business at 17840 Yonge St., which he has owned for eight years.
“We are dying. Who’s gonna to save us?”
His lament is for all small businesses hit hard or forced to close down due to the pandemic, said Liu, a married father of three children aged 10, seven and four.
“A lot of small business are suffering, actually. Not only us. That’s why I wrote down who’s gonna save ‘us.’ The ‘us’ means small business,” he said.
“How are we going to survive? It takes a lot of money to keep (personal and business) things going.”
Business owners are often paying the same rents they faced before the pandemic, despite the drastic loss of business and government promises of help, Liu said.
“None of them give us a break. Nothing changed, except the income for us. To tell the truth, I don’t have much money left,” he said.
Liu’s story attracted several comments from sympathetic residents on community Facebook pages.
For example, Leslee Mason urged residents to support the dry cleaner and also drew attention to the plight of other small business owners.
“The last year has been brutal for many businesses and a lot (even with business supports and grants) are barely getting by,” she said on the Newmarket Shop Local page.
“Please help if you can. Shopping and supporting local is vital to their survival.”
One person said Liu’s heart is in his business and in the Newmarket community.
Another said their heart broke when they saw Liu’s sign. They went in to speak with him and listened to his story of being impacted by the pandemic.
The person also encouraged residents to take their business to Best Eclat.
