KENT, Ohio — The pandemic has made many small business owners like Gwen Rosenberg make tough decisions that hurt their bottom line.

When the pandemic first hit, Rosenberg and her family temporarily shut the doors to Popped, a 9-year-old small business that makes homemade popcorn and candies and confections from scratch. The business is located in both Kent and Ravenna. 

“We technically could have stayed open but I think in the spirit of keeping everyone safe, we closed for about a month and a half, almost two months," she said.

What You Need To Know

  • Local businesses across the country took a major hit with the coronavirus pandemic

  • Some businesses have had to close their doors permanently

  • Shopping local year-round will help small business stay open during these unprecedented times

Temporarily closing Popped hit her family hard financially.

“Since we are a family-owned business this is our sole source of income as a family, so we got four teenage sons, two of them in college, so closing for a couple months was obviously really, really challenging for our family,” she said.

But tough decisions had to be made, Rosenberg said.

“Initially, we made some really, really difficult cuts early on. We pretty much let almost all of our employees go so they could take advantage of unemployment benefits,” she said.

Thanks to her family coming together to operate both locations, Popped was able to reopen.

"When we did re-open again, sales were down dramatically and they remained down all summer until about Dec. 1st. That’s when we started getting regular sales back thanks to the holiday season,” Rosenberg said.

Even though popped and many other small businesses had to overcome challenges during the pandemic, Rosenberg said the community learned some important lessons.

"People sometimes need reminded that the fabric of their community is made of not just their larger institutions, schools and churches and hospitals and things like that, but by small business owners whose kids go to the same schools, who make all of the donations to the fundraisers and the potlucks and that buy the advertising in the music programs,” Rosenberg said.

Now that the major shopping season is over, Rosenberg wants to remind everyone to continue to support small businesses.

"Shopping local isn’t just a one-time event it’s not just during Christmas where you pat yourself on the back, but it’s a cultural shift that you look forward to doing. and when you are a part of an organization and they need to buy lunch - you buy that locally.”