Vancouver restaurants, culinary schools learn to adjust as B.C. emerges from COVID-19 slowdown

The uncertainty in the restaurant industry amid the COVID-19 pandemic has trickled down to culinary schools.

The Pacific Institute of Culinary Arts normally has an enrolment of about 200. It’s slightly below that right now as restrictions on international students have put a dent in the school’s ability to recruit talent.

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“It’s been such a trying time for the industry,” Sylvia Potvin of the Pacific Institute of Culinary Arts said. “A lot of people kind of feel like a yo-yo: you’re in, you’re out. It’s open. It’s closed. How are you supposed to pay your rent?”

During the shutdown, many wait and kitchen staff left the industry and found jobs elsewhere.

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Now that the restrictions are easing, the issue will become more urgent for small operators as the summer progresses and government subsidies are slowly pulled back. Large restaurants and chains can hire hundreds of people and usually pay more.

Pent-up demand is good news for restaurants, but only if there isn’t a choke point with hiring people to serve guests.

It’s forced Vancouver’s Fable Diner to think creatively.

Owner Ron MacGillivray has had to go on a hiring spree. During a recent lunch rush, his most experienced server had just three days of experience under her belt.

“It’s tough, usually the summertime you’re scrambling,” he said. “It is what it is. It’s just a constant thing, I think, in Vancouver.

“We’re hiring some staff that have no restaurant experience and we’ll bring them in now because we have our own online ordering platform. We do our own delivery.”