North Austin News

Before the COVID-19 shut down business, Sherry Gingras hosted classes of 30 people learning and practicing West African drum ensembles at her Austin, Texas, music store. These days Gingras' Drumz students merely check in on Zoom once a week.

“Teaching rhythm patterns online is easy but it’s difficult to play music online together because there’s a lag,” said Gingras, owner of Drumz. “The music doesn’t come together.”

Instead, Gingras is teaching private lessons online and offering curbside repair service.

“My retail store shut down on March 11,” she told North Austin News. “I lost $10,000 in canceled classes alone. It’s too depressing to calculate losses beyond that.”

Starting April 2, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott ordered all Texans to stay home to prevent coronavirus infections, according to the governor’s website. “With COVID-19 spreading across Texas, I issued this executive order that requires all Texans to stay at home except to provide essential services or do essential things like go to the grocery store,” he said April 1.

Abbott has since eased some of the restrictions, allowing all retail stores, restaurants, movie theaters, malls, museums and libraries to reopen May  1 with a 25 percent occupancy limit, according to media reports.

“I’ve only minimally looked into resources for women-owned businesses,” Gingras said in an interview. “There are four or five local organizations that are kicking in extra money for small businesses right now. Austin is doing their part but I don’t have a lot of faith in the governor.”

As of April 30, there were 27,054 reported coronavirus cases and 732 fatalities in Texas, according to the state Department of Health.

Planning a show under this cloud is proving to be difficult, even for Gingras who is a veteran musician. Tentatively, she has booked a concert hall for a class performance Sept. 25 at a local college but she isn’t confident that anyone will attend. 

“We have to start rehearsing the second week in July to be ready for the September show but I don’t know if people will want to sit in a concert hall that holds 450 people because of COVID-19,” Gingras said. “I am playing it by ear. My husband still has his income and I have rental income.”

Plan B, if things don’t go back to normal soon enough, is for Gingras to vacate her retail store and sell musical items online.

“Another potential is to close the store and rent out the house that it’s located in," she said. "I can teach classes in a studio space I’m building in my residence."

Gingras has been able to survive without availing herself of state or federal pandemic loans because she doesn’t have a lot of competition.

“My business is unique,” she said. “I just had one employee who was retired and had a pension so, fortunately, she is OK, and I don’t have to worry about that.”