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“I was never the weed dude,” says Aaron Chamberlin, CEO of Good Things Coming, a new line of cannabis-infused edibles. “I wasn’t sitting around smoking pot all day. But I saw how legalized marijuana was changing the world. I saw the limitations of the restaurant business, and I saw how cannabis could help people with health issues.”
Chamberlin is the chef behind several renowned local restaurants: St. Francis, Phoenix Public Market Cafe, Taco Chelo. But lately, he s taken some time away from the restaurant business. He announced about six months ago that Phoenix Public Market would close a blessing in disguise, he says. “That business hadn’t done well financially for a year,” Chamberlin says. “My landlord had the building under contract and wanted me to leave. It was serendipity.”
An estimated 1,000 restaurants in Arizona closed in 2020, says Arizona Restaurant Association
ABC15
and last updated 2021-01-30 16:50:32-05
Between 10%-12% of the 10,000 restaurants in Arizona â some 1,000 and 1,200 restaurants â closed during the COVID-19 pandemic, according to an estimate from the Arizona Restaurant Association (ARA).
On average, 2%-3% of restaurants, or 200-300 restaurants, close each year in Arizona, the ARA said.
Nationally, an estimated 110,000 restaurants temporarily or permanently closed, the National Restaurant Association said in its â2021 State of the Restaurant Industry Report,â which was released earlier this week.
Some 80% of the restaurant workforce in Arizona â an industry that employees 230,000 people â was laid-off at its highest point, and $2 billion in sales were lost, said Steve Chucri, CEO and president of the Arizona Restaurant Association and an elected member of the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors.