Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, January 21, 1994 TAG: 9401210042
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: DWAYNE YANCEY STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
Well, that's the good news.
At least if you're in the right line of work.
To hear the list of company closings on the radio, you'd think the ice storm of '94 had plunged our economy into the deep-freeze.
Not a chance.
The cold wave has produced both winners - make that winner$$$ - and losers, and sometimes you might be surprised which is which.
To help sort out who's in the money and who's left out in the cold, here's a list of winter-weather winners and losers:
\ Four-wheel drive dealers: WINNERS.
You've put off buying that Jeep Cherokee or Isuzu Trooper one too many times, and now you're stuck in the ditch, while your neighbor's cruising up and down the road like he's leading the Daytona 500.
"The subconscious is going to tell people, `I don't want to go through this again,'" says Rick Johnson, sales manager at Magic City Ford in Roanoke.
He's figuring once the ice melts enough for folks to get in, he'll sell a bunch of heavy-duty vehicles. "Last year after the big snow, a lot of people came in."
\ Tanning parlors: LOSERS.
That's right, losers. At least this week. "People are wearing 14 layers of clothes, and there's no desire to take them all off," laments Becky Snyder of Valley Sun Tanning Salon in Northeast Roanoke.
You'd think folks would be lining up in bad weather for a chance to work on their tans, but human nature doesn't work that way, Snyder says.
"The weather plays a big psychological difference. When it's raining, people think the tanning salons are packed, so they don't go, but they're not. Sunny days are our busiest days. That's when people start getting thoughts of spring and the shorts they want to put on."
Her busy season won't start until March.
Even then, she may feel the financial pinch of the storm. "I know Appalachian Power and Roanoke Gas are having a field day. Some people are going to get hit by big heating bills. When they do, they cut the luxuries. Hair salons and beauty shops are always the first ones to go. But heat's a necessity."
\ Airlines: LOSERS.
The airport's frozen shut. Has been since Monday. "I would say USAir loses a couple hundred thousand each day the airport's closed," says Mac McCadden, the airline's district sales manager.
Leisure travelers may reschedule their trips, but the bulk of the airline's seats are filled by business travelers - and if they can't make that meeting in Atlanta this week, they never do, McCadden says.
It's not just lost ticket sales, either, he says. The airline also has to foot the hotel bill for icebound crews. Three USAir crews, totaling 16 people, are stuck in Roanoke this week, he says.
Which brings us to . . .
\ The Roanoke Express: WINNERS.
The hockey team may have lost to Johnstown on Tuesday night, but the Express still drew 2,892 fans - not bad for a weeknight in Roanoke even in good weather. The weather even helped pad the attendance in one way: Some of those USAir crews stuck at the Radisson-Patrick Henry went to the game, McCadden says.
What else is there to do in Roanoke on an icy Tuesday night?
Besides, most streets are slick enough to double as a hockey rink. Roanoke will know it's a real hockey town when some street-hockey teams start popping up. Isn't that how Wayne Gretzky got started?
\ Travel agents: LOSERS.
Aren't people frantically calling in to book immediate passage to the Caribbean?
Nope, says Gene Swartz of Travelmasters in Roanoke. "I haven't had anybody come in and plunk down a credit card and say, `Get me out of here.'"
Instead, he's busy fetching employees from icebound streets and rerouting stranded airline passengers through Washington, D.C., and Greensboro, N.C.
Nothing glamorous in that.
So what are we doing to get our minds off the weather? Funny you should ask . . .
\ Obstetricians, maternity ward nurses, maternity clothing stores: WINNERS.
Nine months after the great Blizzard of '93, Western Virginia hospitals didn't see any unusual surge of births. No blizzard babies here.
"But that's because the blizzard only lasted for a couple days," says Judy Tynan of Montgomery Regional Hospital in Christiansburg. "It's not like this ice. We're looking at this going on for about a week."
So nine months from now, she's counting on a flurry of "ice babies."
"That'll be good news for us, because we're planning a big expansion in OB," Tynan says. "We'll be ready for them."
\ Farmers: WINNERS AND LOSERS.
It all depends on which end of the food chain you're on.
Cattle farmers need to throw out 50 percent more hay in cold weather, just to keep up the body temperature of their shivering livestock, says Reggie Reynolds of the Virginia Cattlemen's Association in Botetourt County.
Trouble is, hay's hard to find this year and expensive when it is available. Blame the last big weather event for that - the summer's drought quite literally dried up hayfields from Harrisonburg south.
But farmers lucky enough to have some extra hay stashed away may find that the cold snap means cold cash. Bales that normally went for $1 to $1.25 are fetching $2 to $4 each, Reynolds says.
Want some market advice? Chuck that load of firewood and go haul some alfalfa instead.
\ Plumbers: WINNERS AND LOSERS.
"Business is business," says Bob Owen of Owen Plumbing & Heating in Salem. And right now, business is much like the weather - brisk.
But remember - plumbers get cold, too. So anybody who has to work outside in this weather, or even down on all fours in the crawl space beneath your house, can't be counted too lucky.
"It's tough on our employees, and it's hard on the equipment," Owen says.
But just wait until the weather improves. "There will be a lot of replacement of defective units, and there will be some lines that have to be repaired," Owen says.
Cha-ching!
\ Ice companies: LOSERS.
An obvious one, to be sure. But how can you pass up the tale of woe at the Mount Joy Ice Co. in Buchanan?
Yes, there are customers who demand ice in the middle of an ice storm - hospitals that require ice to keep certain medicines cold, for instance.
But that's not the curious part. This is:
Before the storm hit, the company put its fleet of trucks in the garage. Now the garage door is frozen shut. "Two inches of ice," laments Vice President Robert Bankert.
The company's making emergency ice runs in pickup trucks.
by CNB