Shinsen Sushi and Bar Employee Relief Fund

Hi everyone, we just are about to approach 2 years since we opened our doors, but the project has consumed me and my wife day and night for over 4 years. Since we opened, we have served thousands of happy patrons through our creative food, drinks and friendly service. We had to close on March 14th and we shuttered our doors for a week. Turns out people still want and enjoy our food so we opened back up to serve takeout, however, getting the employees back to work was and continues to be an issue.  We have created much more rigorous safety and cleaning protocols and are open only for dinner service in order to keep up with the longer times it takes to prepare and clean after the shifts. This is the keep our staff, customers and delivery workers and families all safe. In addition, most delivery companies are taking 30% off the top of our revenues which makes keeping our business open challenging. Most workers in this industry live paycheck to paycheck and the same is true for the employees at Shinsen. Closing our doors and being out of work throws an uncertainty for the staff and their families. Most of the staff has been here since the beginning and have become part of the family.

The virus has hit the area of Chinatown hard since mid-January with visitors being afraid to come to Chinatown. These struggles have been well documented for Chinatowns across the world. So two months before the city required everyone to stay at home, Shinsen as well as many asian businesses in NYC have been hurting. From February onwards everyone on the staff including chefs, servers and cleaning staff had to take reduced hours (bc I didn't want to lay anyone off), thus seeing less wages and gratuities. 

So I am writing you today to ask if you would be able to donate and help support the staff at your favorite downtown Japanese hangout. Together we can make it through this time! We can’t wait to see you all again at Shinsen. Thank you so much!

Sending a big shout out to everyone we love and those affected by the virus. May you stay safe.