U.S. Senator Catherine Cortez Masto spoke with local restaurant owners about the struggles they've been facing recently.
Restaurant owners who spoke with Senator Cortez Masto said rising gas prices have affected their business in several ways.
They said the cost of living is not only affecting them, but also their employees and customers.
Kasey Christensen, co-owner of Süp, said, "Their gas is more expensive, and their housing is more expensive, and so in order to pay a livable wage for them, we're having to pay more and more out of pocket, and those numbers don't just come from nowhere. We have to raise our prices to keep up with the eternal struggle."
Restaurant owners shared how the rise in gas has affected their business in various ways.
They said everything they need to order for their restaurant is suddenly a lot more expensive.
Marvin Kinney, co-owner of R Town Pizza and dough.cheese.sauce said, "Even my furniture along those borders between just the cost of goods going up from COVID, between tariffs, between gas prices, every one of our distributors now not only has a delivery fee that was left over from COVID, we now have a gas fee, and that's a percentage of it, usually about 3% tacked on."
Business owners throughout our community agree that these are challenges that not only Nevadans are facing.
Steve Ferguson, owner of Chop Stop, stated, "I was at a restaurant conference in Dallas earlier this week, about 500 restaurant attendees, and this isn't just a Nevada problem. It's like it's a U.S. problem. We've got significant challenges in the restaurant industry across the country right now."
Senator Cortez shared how business owners throughout the state have told her how uncertain they feel about what the future holds for them.
The Senator said, "Unfortunately, we've got nothing but chaos and uncertainty and then policies that are actually contributing to the challenges, the high costs, and if people don't realize when we're talking about blanket tariffs against other countries, the people that are actually paying for those tariffs are Americans, our businesses."
Restaurant owners also said some of their businesses are not even making a profit.
They are barely making enough to cover the rise in costs, pay their employees, and keep their building open.
