This article is a way for us to touch base with our customers about Story Screen Beacon Theater's response to the COVID-19 virus. While we are remaining fully operational for the time being, we want to reassure you that we are taking COVID-19 very seriously and will refrain from our usual sassy demeanor (mostly) while we update you on how we are proceeding.
HEALTH & SAFETY AT STORY SCREEN
We are diligently monitoring updates released by both the CDC and the NYS Department of Health, and will be making the appropriate changes and taking action wherever necessary. The health and safety of our team, our customers and our community at large are our top priority.
As many of you know, we run a very tight ship over at Story Screen Beacon Theater, of which cleanliness has been a #1 focus from the first day we opened our doors. The very goal of our theater was to upgrade the movie-going experience by creating a comfortable, CLEAN and sanitary space to enjoy a movie outside of your home.
· Our nature as a strictly hypoallergenic facility, not allowing outside food and not serving any refreshments that contain any hypo-allergens (ex: no peanuts in house – ever!) has equipped us with a strict deep-clean policy in place not only at the end of each day, but in between every screening in every theater.
· We continuously run a state-of-the-art fresh air system 24/7 that works to constantly exchange the air inside of the theaters with fresh air from outside of the building.
· You can rest assured that our theater is tip top clean every time you step foot inside for a screening. And even though we are 100% confident in our normal operations, the Story Screen Beacon Theater cleaning protocol has been intensified, and the products we use have now been upgraded to the use of only hospital-grade level disinfectant. We are also taking a proactive approach to occupancy, limiting our regular capacity to ensure a comfortable social distance between guests in our theater.
· Can you tell that we’re serious about germs around here?! Check out the kindest words from this self-proclaimed “germophobe mom” about our theater during our busiest season:
MOVIE INDUSTRY IMPACT
A major impact of this event on our small business has been the decision from major studios to delay the release of some of the films we had planned to share. We work closely with independent and major studios alike to curate the best line-up week to week, and fully support the decisions of these distributors to hold off on some of their major releases. We'd like to let you all know that all films we have booked for future screenings will still be available to you once specific studios have publicly announced their updated schedules for roll out.
TRANSPARENCY & UPDATES
Our policy is to be as open and transparent as possible. This is a developing situation and may change again in the coming weeks. We will be updating you through our newsletter (which you can sign up for at the bottom of this page) as well as on our social media accounts (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter). Please follow us to receive not only fun movie stuff, but also up to date info on this matter as it becomes available to us.
Finally, we ask that if you feel as though you may be sick, please do NOT attend a screening or event at our theater, no matter how badly you want to visit us. We’ll see you again on the other side of this thing!
Stay safe. Wash your hands. Practice your elbow bumps, and take care of one another.
UPDATED:
03/16/2020
Welp, we gave it a shot, gang! But due to the safety restrictions now placed upon New York State's movie theaters (not to mention restaurants, bars, music venues, etc) Story Screen Beacon Theater will be temporarily halting operations until restrictions are lifted. For now, we will continue our posting of online content like normal, and will even try to curate some new things for our readers to enjoy while hunkering down. When we have a plan for reopening, rest assured we will be pretty loud about it, but keep your ears to our social media (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter) anyhow just to be safe. It will be a pretty wild return.
This is harrowingly bad news for us, and can be felt in equal measure from all our brothers and sisters in the small business community in our surrounding areas. We have some ideas in mind to not only offer an escape from all this madness, but to also allow those of you out there looking to show support for our little venture. We'll be rolling those out in the coming days, so be sure to keep your eyes peeled for those. And naturally, you could head over to our site’s store and purchase a digital gift card of any amount you wish to use at a future date once we have reopened our doors. There may even be some pretty cool surprises coming your way should you, say, purchase a gift card of $50 dollars or more. There's just no way of knowing, really, you'll just have to try it out and see!
On that note, we want to thank everyone for their past and continued support of our theater. We've been welcomed into the weekly activities of the City of Beacon, and we're not at all weirded out to say that we consider many of you more than customers and supporters, but also friends. Beacon truly is a unique spot with unique advantages, and one of the things that really makes Beacon special is its slew of various small businesses. These are distinct outlets run by some exceptional people, and they ALL work endlessly week after week to supply the demand this city can throw at it. They are as much a part of what makes Beacon what it is as the people that populate it, and they are going to need all the help they can get in the coming weeks. Things are going to be hard for everyone, but we ask that, where you can, please seek out local business's social media accounts, share their information with anyone you think may be interested, and take advantage of any special offers many will be promoting during this change in normal operations.
We will all get through this the same way anybody can always get through something: together.
Wash your hands, please. Take care of yourself. Be sure to take care of others, and we'll see you on the other side of this thing.
- The Story Screen Family
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