A new website has launched to support Guernsey’s food scene during the Covid-19 crisis.
Guernsey Together is an online hub that offers restaurants, retailers, hedge veg stalls, charities and more, an opportunity to let customers know they are still open for business.
The website is the idea Philip Smith, owner of CBO Projects, who was moved to help after reading social media updates from worried restaurants facing difficult decisions.
‘Our hospitality sector is really important to the island, not only for visitors but for our community. I had the idea to provide a central place that could list, with contact details, all the restaurants that were now offering a takeaway menu. We are so lucky to have so many good restaurants on the island and I wanted to create an opportunity for people to support when and where they can,’ said Philip, who is also a director of the Guernsey-based charity This Is EPIC.
‘I posted the idea out on Twitter and it got a good reaction. Then this nice chap, Paul Merrien, offered up his website hosting services and support. So I purchased the domain, Paul set-up the hosting and we worked together in our respective homes for a few hours building the site. Now we just continue to tweak it and share ideas for how to make it even better.’
Free to list
It is free to list services on the website and, currently, the Guernsey Together team is trawling social media to see what food services are being offered. A new public listing button will soon be added to the website allowing businesses to list themselves.
‘I run a business myself so I know full well that everyone is being hit economically at the moment and will be ensuring they have enough themselves to survive this crisis. But I hope that when and where possible, we are able to support the local hospitality businesses and order from their takeaway/delivery menus as our own individual financial situations allow,’ Philip said.
‘We need to pull together as a community during this crisis. We are all social distancing, so sharing information online will be one way to get the message out to people about how they can help and services they can access as we are spending much of the day in our homes.
‘One other thing I would love to see is people paying it forward and buying meal vouchers from restaurants for our amazing medical care staff and emergency response team who are on the front line of battling the virus.’
For more information, visit Guernsey Together.