WATERLOO -- A typical Boxing Day would see parking lots of Waterloo Region retailers flooded with shoppers, but this year it was the exact opposite.
The Ontario-wide lockdown came into effect on Saturday to help curb surging COVID-19 numbers.
Now, non-essential businesses have been limited to curbside pickup or delivery, those selling essentials have new capacity limits, restaurant dining rooms are closed, outdoor markets are shut down, as are ski hills and personal care services, among many others.
Resident Bill Lizun noted the major differences in Uptown Waterloo as he was out.
"[Usually] down here you see lots of people shopping, everybody going in for the big sales," he said. "[Now] it's dead."
Erika Litchgy also notice the region's major malls, which are on appointment-based entries, were scarcely populated.
"It was like a ghost town in there," she said. "There were definitely very few people in there."
Local, non-essential retail owners, like Pasha Georgopoulos of Erban Corner, say they've been hit the hardest, and are relying on social media marketing to make up for missing foot traffic.
"We do miss our customers quite a bit," she said. "We do have a lot of special requests, we've got our cell phones on, people will text us if there is something that they are in need of right away and we get back to them.
"We just want people to come back and feel safe in our location."
The Canadian Federation of Independent Businesses (CFIB) says that pivoting online is harder than it seems and can be considered an uphill battle for many.
"It not only takes money to set up a website, but also a lot of technical expertise," said Ryan Mallough, CFIB Ontario Director of Provincial Affairs. "When you're new, it takes things like inventory management, setting up a delivery network, and quite frankly, things that a company like Amazon is already good at."
