Brexit and pandemic blamed for Horsham restaurant staff crisis

The Burger Shop in Piries Place shut on Monday and will remain closed until September 23.

In a statement, the company said: “The world’s economy came to a sudden stop almost overnight due to the Covid-19 pandemic causing unprecedented challenges in the hospitality sector.

"It led to a mass exodus of overseas workers, all of whom quite rightly wanted to return to their families and homelands.

"This, combined with the impact of staff shortages arising from Brexit and the subsequent prevention of free movement of labour as we exited the EU, means the hospitality sector has been hit twice with staff shortages.

“Hospitality businesses are more than twice as likely as other industries to be experiencing challenges in filling vacancies compared with normal expectations for this time of year.”

Oliver Fricker, operations director of The Burger Shop Co restaurant in Horsham said: “Unfortunately, we have found it very hard to recruit staff of the standard that we require and, as such, have seen an unusual level of staff turnover over the last year.

"This has had a very negative effect on our customer service and business as a whole. We pride ourselves on providing both delicious food and an epic experience, but we know we simply haven’t been able to deliver that recently.

“So, we’ve taken the tough decision to close our Horsham restaurant from Monday 12th September and will re-open on Friday 23rd September to give our new team members plenty of support and training.

"This training period will help us return to the high standards of service that our customers deserve.”

Meanwhile, the restaurant’s click-and-collect service and Deliveroo deliveries are still being maintained.

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David added: “We’re also contacting all customers who have kindly given us feedback to thank them for their support and invite them back once we reopen. We look forward to welcoming everyone.”

The Burger Shop is a family owned business with a restaurant in Arundel as well as Horsham.