Milton salon benefits from PPP loans
Puttin’ On The Ritz co-owner Helena Pepper said when COVID-19 spread across Delaware in March 2020, it was nearly a death blow for her Milton-based salon.
A 27-year veteran of the beauty industry, Pepper, who has owned Puttin’ On The Ritz with her husband Dean for 12 years, had to close for two months due to COVID-related lockdowns. She said she wasn’t sure she was going to be able to pay her rent or keep her employees on the payroll. But when Congress passed the first COVID relief bill in April 2020, the newly instituted Paycheck Protection Program gave her a lifeline.
“The PPP loan helped me pay my bills and kept my girls from collecting unemployment, which I didn’t really want them doing. This helped me be able to pay them like a regular paycheck every week for two months,” Pepper said.
She said she used about 75 percent of her initial loan on payroll until businesses began reopening under occupancy limits.
“It kept me afloat. It kept me from worrying about whether I could continue having this business. We’re a business that if people can’t get in here, they’re going to go somewhere else. So we were just trying to keep afloat, keep our clients happy and use that money the right way,” Pepper said.
Occupancy levels for salons are still only at 60 percent of pre-COVID levels, so when Congress passed the American Rescue Act in March, it led to a new round of PPP funding for small businesses like Puttin’ On The Ritz that will help keep stylists’ salaries at pre-COVID levels.
Pepper said even with COVID vaccinations ramping up, people are still unsure about going back into the salons; she said Puttin’ On The Ritz is still not able to take walk-ins, which were a huge part of her pre-COVID business.
“We’re not really full force yet. We were a walk-in salon. When these girls aren’t busy with someone or if someone cancels an appointment, we can’t just take someone. You have to have an appointment. That void that we would have would’ve been filled by a walk-in,” she said.
The PPP program involved federal funds being diverted to local banks and then passed on to businesses in the form of loans. The Small Business Administration guarantees the loans, serving as liaison between the federal government and the banks.
John Banks, deputy director for the SBA’s Delaware District Office, said the program was structured so that over a 10-week span, as long as at least 60 percent of the funds went to payroll and up to 40 percent to expenses, the loan would be forgiven. Puttin’ On The Ritz’s first loan was forgiven, and their second is also expected to be forgiven. Banks said when the program wraps up at the end of May, Delaware businesses would receive $1.5 billion in federal loans.
U.S. Sen. Tom Carper was here to see the effects of the loans firsthand during an April 23 visit.
“The best way we can help somebody is to make sure they have a job, and they can support themselves and their family. Sometimes people just need a helping hand to get through tough times, and that’s what we’ve provided over the last year or so,” Carper said.
“I just want to make sure these girls and I have a job to come to. It gives you a good peace of mind,” Pepper said.
