San Antonio – Outdoor venues that depend on good summer weather for their financial peak are struggling to stay afloat in San Antonio, due to all the rain that’s fallen so far this year.
James Kinney, with Splashtown, said all the rain this month has impacted their attendance.
“This week, we’ve been running at maybe a quarter of the attendance that we should during the week,” he said.
The Fourth of July weekend was not any better. May was poor, June was better and then July hit. His business struggled to reopen following the damage from the February storm.
Kinney said he was hopeful summer would boost their business.
“This has been a struggle. And 2019 wasn’t exactly good weather either. And then 2020 happened, and now we’re on this roller coaster, so to speak, of weather this year,” Kinney said.
Hope Roth, with the San Antonio Zoo, said there’s still a lot of indoor activities available for those who visit the zoo during a rainy day.
“Ticket sales are so important to the zoo. We rely 100% on them and we’re not funded by the city or the state or the county. So we encourage everybody to bear with the weather and come visit us,” Roth said.
Mitchell Andry, with Cool Crest Mini Golf Course, said they’ve only been open about 20% of the time since weather turned bad.
“If it’s wet we can open the golf course, we just need to make sure it’s safe,” Andry said. But other businesses connected to them are also feeling the trickle effect of a wet summer. “We’re holding on with both hands, we don’t have an option B for our beer garden.”
Even businesses that bloom during rainy weather can’t keep up.
Christy Rohlf, with Liberty Lawn and Landscaping, said they’re turning customers away because rain causes project delays and their schedule to suffer. But the worst part is they’re having trouble hiring more staff.
“We’re having to juggle multiple issues this year with weather that we’ve never had to do before. It’s been quite a learning experience,” she said.
Kinney said he’s also still having trouble hiring people in the middle of the season. He’s putting out a call for more staff.
First the pandemic, then the February storm, and now a rainy summer, small businesses hope the clouds of financial uncertainty clear soon.
“The sun will come out tomorrow, isn’t that what they say?” smiles Kinney.