Brief video of Harrisburg-area small business owners and a bank executive describing the sudden economic impact of the COVID-19 shutdown in central Pennsylvania (Harrisburg area) in 2020 and crediting the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) with providing critical financial support that allowed them to retain or rehire employees and keep businesses operating.
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I'm Patty Husick, President and CEO of Centric Bank. I'm one of the founders of Centric Bank. My name is Darmae Robertson. I'm one of the owners here at Sweet Confections Cakes. I'm Willard Robertson, the baker. My job is just basically maintenance and baking. I'm Ann Dieter Gallagher and I am owner and CEO of Dieter Gallagher Group. I'm Janine Diaz and I am a first generation immigrant from the Philippines.
I'm Jessica Myers. I'm the CEO and owner of GEM Group llc. We are a commercial construction company based right outside of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.
My name is Sue Pera. I am the owner of Cornerstone Coffee House in Camphill, Pennsylvania. Covid crisis was so intense and the impact so deep, really devastating to us as business owners. It was so sudden, The governor shut down our area of central Pennsylvania, the Harrisburg area. And once he did that, it was wham, there was nothing. So at that point we had no choice but to let our employees go because we did not have work to support them.
So in less than 24 hours, we had to shut down every single job site.
One day you're busy, people are coming in and next day you could just feel it. It was palpable.
We basically had to lay off half of our company and all the revenue that was coming in the door stopped for a period of time. For six weeks to be exact, we.
Had to lay off all but five. On Monday we were getting 500 cases. The next day we had like maybe 10. For us, it was all hands on deck. How can we be ready to help small businesses in the markets we serve? And that isn't just our customers. We also helped non customers at the time. So in less than 48 hours, our team built a loan portal to be able to facilitate the demand that we expected for us. When they offered the paycheck protection program, it was pretty much a lifesaver. PPP became the gap, seriously, the line between open and close.
Our team at GEM Group, we're very grateful to have a partner like SBA to help us through this challenging time.
When we found out about the patient, the ppp, it literally, it gave us oxygen. If we didn't have that, I'm not sure we were honestly where we would be right now.
Ultimately, we thought it would be a good fit for our company for a variety of reasons. But the number one reason was we could bring back our people.
We were able to, thanks to the SBA and PPP funding, we were able to keep everybody on and really didn't skip a beat. We now have up to 30 people working. PPP was a true lifeline. That paycheck protection program was really a huge help for us and we brought back our employee. We have been working overtime since. We're going to come out of this and be better and stronger and survivors. Sam.
