EAST VILLAGE — While most stores closed as a precaution for Hurricane Irene, those who stayed opened were slammed with a deluge of customers over the weekend.
Many cafes, including the majority of Starbucks, were shut on Sunday as Hurricane Irene battered Manhattan with high winds and almost 7 inches of rain. Businesses owners who braved the hurricane were rewarded with brisk sales.
"It was good. Tiring," said Jazmin Diaz, a 19-year-old worker at Sugar, a café on the corner of Houston and Allen streets. "I was surprised a lot of people came out, but New Yorkers always surprise you."
According to Diaz, the 24-hour café wanted to remain open for its customers and even kept deliveries throughout Saturday night and Sunday morning.
“It was really packed, all the tables were full,” she said. While the early hours of Sunday morning saw only a few local customers and guests from a nearby hotel, business started to pick up from 6 a.m.
Blackbird, a boutique coffee house at 72 E. 1st Street, made as much money in just six hours Sunday as it would have made in a very busy 10-hour day.
“It was just a lot of fun. It was nonstop for hours,” said Josip Draženović, the 21-year-old coffee director at the store. "Business was blowing."
The store hadn't planned to open on Sunday because of the hurricane, but when the storm failed to meet expectations Draženović was called in. There were many customers on Sunday who had never been to Blackbird before and Draženović predicts the store may have made some new regulars.
“People were so grateful – ‘Your our savior,'” he said.
Not surprisingly, neighborhood bodegas were a beacon of light throughout the storm for many residents.
Helen Seo, a 20-year-old whose parents own the S.K Deli Market on Second Avenue at E. 5thStreet in the East Village, kept the store open throughout Saturday night and Sunday morning.
"I knew it wasn't going to be that bad," said Seo, who remarked that many of the customers were police officers on patrol.
Konditori, a boutique bakery and coffee house few stores from Sugar on Allen Street, opened at 11 a.m on Sunday morning and did a brisk business, according to one employee.
"We were really busy," said Whitney, 24, who did not want to give her last name. "Busy as we have ever been. It was crazy. There was a line out the door."
