Leisure Firms Say TV News Viewers Are Taking a Break

Bars, restaurants and theaters reported a sharp decrease in business during the first few days of the Persian Gulf crisis, but now Americans seem to be ungluing themselves from their television sets and going out again. Some believe that leisure-time businesses will get a boost if the hostilities drag on because people will turn to entertainment to escape war worries.

“During the first week, I sense that everybody is going home as soon as they can to get the news,” said Jack Kyser, chief economist with the Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce. “But this (war) is probably going to go on for a couple of months. By then, people are going to say, ‘I am overloaded. I am going to go shopping . . . or to Disneyland or Universal Studios.’ In past conflicts we found that people wanted to forget, so they turned to entertainment.”

Indeed, many businesses and residents said the wartime pattern has already started to emerge. Businesses ranging from restaurants and movie theaters to video stores and bowling alleys indicated that sales were moribund when the bombing first started. Americans simply stayed home to hear news about the Persian Gulf. But business is already picking back up.

“We had a 30% to 40% decrease in business on Wednesday and Thursday nights,” said Susan McKie, manager of the Ritz Grill in Pasadena. “It was really slow. But by this weekend things pretty much went back to normal.”

Video rental stores across the country reported a similar slump, according to a spot check of about 30 such establishments.

“The first day of the crisis was one of the worst days we’ve ever had,” said Lou Berg, who runs the Audio-Video Plus chain in Houston, echoing the complaint of many of the retailers.

But on Friday, business began to improve in most places. “What’s happening is so grim that people need a rest from it,” said Cy Jervis of Foster Video in Foster, R.I.

Added Brad Burnside, of the Video Adventure chain in the Chicago area: “With regular TV programming interrupted, people have started to get tired of watching the war. Unless the war takes a dramatic turn for the worse, rentals should increase this weekend.”

Ticket sales were also down dramatically at movie theaters Wednesday, according to John Krier, president of Exhibitor Relations, a West Hollywood-based firm that tracks movie receipts. Krier estimates that sales fell 25% to 30% Wednesday, but they were off only slightly Thursday and returned to normal for the weekend.

Meanwhile, attendance at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit was running more than 10% below last year, according to early estimates by the Detroit Auto Dealers Assn.

Indeed, people who were mesmerized by broadcast reports on the Persian Gulf War said they got off of their couches over the weekend to go out and spend money on leisure-time activities again.

Consider Roy Seibert. He stayed in and kept his eyes on TV news for three days. But by Saturday, he was delighted to get away to meet a friend for a restaurant meal.

Watching the news “gets old after a while,” said Seibert, a museum operations manager from Harrisburg, Pa., who was in Los Angeles to visit friends and relatives. “Me changing my lifestyle (and watching more news) is not going to change anything over there.”

Business at various types of retail establishments has already been slow for months, at least partly because of the nation’s recession. Worries about the recession, along with the war, are expected to continue dampening consumers’ impulse buying and spending on big-ticket items throughout much of this year.

At the Fan Fair sports clothing shop in the San Fernando Valley’s Northridge Fashion Center, manager Pat Larsen said “it was really quiet” after news came out Wednesday about the outbreak of war. “People were stunned, I guess.”

Three days later, Larsen said, business was “not as much as usual on a weekend, but it’s picked up a lot. It’s a nice increase.”

However, some theme parks, such as Disneyland and Sea World, said there had been no perceptible change in activity since the war broke out.

“It seems like a real typical day at the Magic Kingdom,” said Barbara Warren, a spokeswoman at Disneyland in Anaheim. Still, visits to theme parks are often planned several weeks in advance, so it might be some time before they see an impact from the war.

Meanwhile, Lew Kodner, assistant manager of Woodlake Bowl in Woodland Hills, said his Friday night business was up slightly.

One weekend customer, Jeff Mazur, a television studio engineer from West Hills, came to compete in a bowling contest. “You’ve got to do something,” he said.

“At first you could watch TV 24 hours a day.” But, Mazur added, “it does tend to get boring.”

At a nearby lane, Jared Book, also of West Hills, said his family stayed home Wednesday instead of going out to eat so they could watch the gulf crisis on TV. On Saturday, though, he was at the lanes to take his 8-year-old son to a children’s league bowling match.

“It’s good for the kids,” he said. “They need to do their normal activities. It’s not fair for them to miss activities because of something they have no control over.”

Business was also said to be up at the Agoura Indoor Shooting Range in Agoura Hills. Although regulars at shooting ranges say they come to get a break from their daily routines and worries, another factor also may have been responsible for the increased interest.

“The people we’re starting to get in now are military types,” including many reservists, “who are boning up on their handguns,” said office manager Marnie Cosgrove.

Times staff writers Dennis Hunt and Greg Johnson contributed to this story.

ESCAPING THE WAR * Several restaurants and bars said business was down 30% to 40% on Wednesday and Thursday.

* Video rentals were also off sharply, according to a spot check of about 25 locations.

* Movie theater ticket sales slid 25% to 30% Wednesday and were down slightly Thursday as well, according to Exhibitor Relations, a West Hollywood-based firm that tracks box-office receipts.

* Business at several shopping malls also seemed unusually slow, although some said the cause could have been the domestic recession as easily as the situation in the Persian Gulf.

* Theme parks, such as Disneyland and Sea World, have yet to see an impact from the breakout of war. But park representatives noted that visits to theme parks are often planned weeks in advance, so the impact could be delayed.