Lehigh Valley businesses begin to reopen Friday: Here’s what to expect at area retailers, restaurants and child care providers

Friday is when the Lehigh Valley will shed the red and enter the yellow phase of the state’s reopening plan, providing a clearer glimpse of what the much discussed “new normal” for businesses may eventually look like.

Domaci, a South Side Bethlehem home furnishings retailer, plans to open from noon to 7 p.m. Friday, operating at 50% capacity and requiring employees and customers to wear masks. Co-founder Warren Clark said the store at 21 E. Third St. also has temporarily closed its restrooms to the public, installed sneeze guards at its checkout counter and elevated its cleaning and sanitizing. If customers prefer curbside pickup, they can do that instead.

“We’re excited to get back," Clark said Tuesday. "It’s just a matter of cleaning and freshening up the store.”

These grand reopenings of sorts will occur in the coming days across Lehigh and Northampton counties, two of the 10 remaining red Pennsylvania counties that will transition to yellow Friday.

In the yellow phase, in-person retail is allowed, though curbside and delivery is still preferred. Restaurants and bars, having to survive to this point on a diet of takeout and delivery, are permitted to open outdoor dining. Child care centers also may open. All establishments allowed to reopen are expected to follow social distancing and cleaning guidelines.

In the yellow, large gatherings of more than 25 people are still prohibited, a restriction that swells to no more than 250 people when a county enters the green phase. Also in the green phase, businesses such as hair salons, barbershops, gyms, spas, casinos, theaters and enclosed shopping malls can open at 50% occupancy.

But the Lehigh Valley isn’t there yet.

The Promenade Shops at Saucon Valley, an outdoor lifestyle center with exterior entrances, plans to reopen from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Friday, offering curbside pickup zones and extended patio space for its restaurants.

As of Wednesday evening, Lehigh Valley Mall in Whitehall Township hadn’t made any reopening announcements on its website. A mall representative only said it would be updated accordingly. At indoor malls, state guidelines say only tenants with exterior entrances -- in addition to pharmacy or health care tenants -- may open to customers in the yellow phase. All mall tenants, however, can offer curbside pickup, fulfilled outside the mall interior, in the yellow phase.

Boscov’s, which has an exterior entrance at Lehigh Valley Mall, plans to reopen there Saturday.

The Berks County department store chain announced Wednesday that 13 stores, including its locations at Lehigh Valley Mall and Palmer Park Mall in Palmer Township, will reopen at 11 a.m. Saturday. All Boscov’s employees and customers will be required to wear a mask, and the chain installed plexiglass screens at each register and temporarily closed its dressing rooms.

As employees return to work, child care options also should increase in the yellow phase.

Lehigh Valley Children’s Centers, which has 30 locations in the Lehigh Valley that typically serve 1,300 children daily, hopes to have 11 locations reopened Monday, said Shawn Deiter, marketing and communications manager. Four already are open, recipients of state waivers to help ensure essential workers have child care options. LVCC’s remaining sites are in elementary schools, which are closed.

“The good thing is with us opening in phases, it’s helped us look at what’s working and what’s not,” she said. “That way we can keep improving the process.”

Typically, parents at LVCC locations would go to classrooms to sign the child in and then out. Now, parents can expect daily drop-off locations in designated areas at each site, where a LVCC staff member will take the child’s temperature. LVCC also will send children home if they show any sign of illness, Deiter said, and they’re asking parents to keep sick children at home.

LVCC teachers will wear face coverings, she noted. Something that may vary by child care provider is whether children over 2 years old will wear face coverings. Deiter said LVCC decided its younger children will not wear face coverings, since they may constantly touch their mask and create a more hazardous situation.

Inside the classroom, she said there will be increased handwashing, more cleaning and disinfecting of frequently touched surfaces and smaller group sizes. If a table normally held six children, Deiter said, LVCC may decrease that number so children are farther apart. In addition, LVCC’s typical family-style meals where children help serve themselves will transition to staff members serving individually plated meals and snacks, she said.

Restaurants also are busy preparing for the yellow phase, allowing them to serve up an outdoor experience to people who haven’t dined out since March.

Billy Kounoupis, owner of Billy’s Downtown Diner restaurants in Allentown, Bethlehem and Easton, said he plans to open his Easton and Bethlehem locations for outdoor seating Friday with extended hours and then the Allentown patio early next week.

The restaurants will keep outdoor chairs 6 feet apart and offer guests high-grade disposable silverware, or real silverware if they prefer. Staff members -- Billy’s has 100-plus across the three locations -- will wear masks, he said. Always a pet-friendly restaurant, Billy’s is looking at reservations for people who want to bring their pet along, Kounoupis said.

Billy’s also will use QR codes at its tables, so diners can use their smartphones to view a menu, making the process as contactless as possible. In terms of sanitation, Kounoupis said rigorous cleaning has always been stressed in his restaurants and throughout much of the industry.

“Right now, we have to work aggressively to build up consumer confidence and let them know it’s safe to eat at restaurants in the Lehigh Valley,” he said, noting a dining experience -- even an outdoor one -- should hopefully give people some sense of normalcy.

Each of the area’s three major cities also announced plans to enact street closures to help permitted establishments extend their footprints for outdoor dining.

For those looking to sell and serve alcohol, the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board on Wednesday announced an expedited approval process for licensees looking to temporarily extend their licensed premises to include more outdoor space.

But there’s still plenty of uncertainty, such as how consumers will react as reopening begins, something that should become clearer as things inch forward slowly.

Domaci, the Bethlehem home furnishings retailer, will resume a moving sale as it prepares to relocate to the city’s Main Street, a move that was pushed back due to the pandemic and is now likely for August.

The business, which saw a boost in online traffic during its closure, expects to see a good response from customers. Clark said most of the feedback he’s gotten is people are excited to get back out again and alleviate their cabin fever.

“I think we’re going to learn as we go," Clark said. "It’s a new normal. I think everyone is going to be in the same boat.”

Morning Call reporter Jon Harris can be reached at 610-820-6779 or at jon.harris@mcall.com.

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