From the right are Rose, Eric, Quin, and Graham of Nuch’s Pizzeria and Restaurant, which cranks out NY-style pizza and handmade pasta. Rose, the owner and head chef, has had to close their dining room, but the switch to curbside pickup has helped them keep the doors open.
Local Photographer Captures Struggles of Small Businesses
Jesse Justice left a career in Washington, D.C., and New York where most of his photography work was editorial and commercial, to move to Utah with XMRadio.building a portraiture business on the side. He left his tech job with a banking software company to transition to full-time photography in January. “Since the quarantine, my wife has been working from home and and I was just hanging around the house shooting bugs and weeds with a macro lens,” he says. Then it occurred to him that “we have artist friends and we knew they were struggling.”
“My purpose in taking these pictures was to illustrate the people I know who are actually changing their lives, changing their whole business model, changing their hours, selling stuff they don’t usually sell, so they can stay in business, take care of their employees and survive.”
“I can’t imagine what it’s like for them—I’m in a business where I can weather these things, but most cannot. When I call to ask if I can photograph, I tell them I want to commemorate the effort they’re making to take care of their people. I have a rig so I can give them a postcard right when I take the picture, then I send them a print.”
Justice sees the outcome of Covid-19 as changing individualism into community.
“It’s like wearing a mask,” he says. The masks aren’t for me, they’re for you, to keep other people from getting sick.”
“The photographs are my way of saying thank you for keeping on keeping on.”
Alex Gregory is a tattoo artist, painter, woodworker, and resin-pourer. Her tattoo business has necessarily come to a halt during the pandemic, and she has had to devote her time, at home, to commissioned art and the old-fashioned hustle. Survival is almost always hard for artists, and the recent changes make it even harder.
Pictured are owner Bren Nielsen (far right) and some fo the employees at the Medicine Center Compounding Pharmacy on the south side of Salt Lake City. The Medicine Center has had no choice but to stay open during the coronavirus crisis, but the whole staff is completely upbeat and ready to serve the community with medication services, over the counter products, and specialty items.
From the right are Rose, Eric, Quin, and Graham of Nuch’s Pizzeria and Restaurant, which cranks out NY-style pizza and handmade pasta. Rose, the owner and head chef, has had to close their dining room, but the switch to curbside pickup has helped them keep the doors open.
Dale Aramaki, of Uptown Service. Uptown Service has remained open during the novel coronavirus pandemic, ensuring gas is available and automobiles can be fixed.
From left are Jake, Amy, Will, and Rachael Wilson. Will and Amy own and run Snider Bros. Meats. In addition to keeping the doors open for the community to stock up on meat, they’ve worked around the clock to source and prepare foodstuffs not normally in their inventory so shoppers can stock their fridges and freezers in fewer trips. To care for their staff, they’ve modified the store hours so that they can manage the demand during this crisis, while ensuring everyone has time to rest and reset between s
Chef Marco Silva is the owner and head chef of The Charleston Draper in Draper, UT. Chef Marco has had to close his dining room, but he is making sure his customers don’t go without his Brazilian fish stew or Coq au Vin by offering curbside pickup of anything on the dinner menu
For more photography by Jesse Justice, click here.
Mary Brown Malouf is the late Executive Editor of Salt Lake magazine and Utah's expert on local food and dining. She still does not, however, know how to make a decent cup of coffee.
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