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Europe's Businesses Work Overtime, but Are They Booming?

Marthe van der Wolf

   AMSTERDAM - With shops, hairdressers and other places opening again
   across Europe, business owners are working overtime to ensure they will
   make up the lost income after two months of closure.'ŻBut few believe
   this spike in pent-up business signals a post-crisis boom.

   Wils Wolvers --whose salon outside of The Hague has been operating for
   the past 14 years --got 1,500 bookings in the days after it was
   announced he could reopen. After being closed for two months, he and
   his team are working around the clock to keep up.
   "We had to put in screens in between the washroom units so we could
   still wash people or else they will be sitting next to each other. And
   between our stations where we cut and color, we also have screens.
   Normally we could have five or six people at a time. But we can do half
   of it. So that's why we're open for seven days, including nights," he
   explained.
   Wolvers is happy to be fully booked for the foreseeable future but
   doubts the bookings will make up for the loss of income when the salon
   was closed.
   Government relief money helped his business pay for employees' salaries
   during lockdown, but he still had to spend his part of his savings on
   fixed costs, such as insurance and mortgage.

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