Preparing to Reopen in the Wake of COVID-19

Preparing to Reopen in the Wake of COVID-19

As we begin to look at reopening our community to residents and visitors, I want to tell you about a specific initiative the chamber started on April 15 to help you prepare your business. We know this is a top concern for you as we approach our important summer season.

While it is still too early to know specifically when the state is going to allow the full reopening of businesses, we do know reopening will take a phased approach to slowly bring business back up to full operation while addressing the safety concerns of residents and visitors.

To ensure our tourism businesses have clarity on how to reopen safely in the wake of this pandemic, we launched the Accelerate Myrtle Beach Recovery Task Force in collaboration with the Myrtle Beach Area Hospitality Association.

The task force volunteered their time to provide their knowledge and expertise as we worked to quickly identify best practices for safely reopening, to address social distancing requirements and to create a playbook for each tourism business sector’s individual situation and needs.

We have published these guidelines on our website, MyrtleBeachAreaChamber.com. They incorporate guidance from the CDC and other government agencies, national associations, as well as the input of our local business community. We hope you will use these as you begin to prepare your business for reopening.

We are also sharing these guidelines with local elected leaders of the Grand Strand and with the Accelerate SC task force. Of course, any order enacted by local, state or federal governments regarding similar guidance and/or safety measures will supersede these suggested guidelines.

I want to personally thank the members of the task force for their participation and the time spent developing these guidelines; Stuart Butler, CVB Marketing Council Chairman and Stephen Greene, Hospitality Association President and CEO; Matthew Brittain, Bob Barenberg and Matt Klugman for their work on the lodging guidelines; Heidi Vukov for restaurants, Jim Powalie for retail, Dave Genevro for golf courses; and Robert Stinnett, Pablo Chavez, Mark Lazarus and David Olive for their work on guidelines for reopening attractions and entertainment venues. Finally, many thanks to Chief Amy Prock and Captain Eric DiLorenzo from the Myrtle Beach Police Department for their input on enforcement.

The chamber team is also drafting suggested guidelines for non-tourism related businesses and we will post those on our website once complete.

If you have any questions or concerns about the task force or the guidelines, please contact us at AskUs@VisitMyrtleBeach.com.