The Baton Rouge curfew forced residents to scurry home early and businesses to close much earlier than usual. The curfew also curbed revenue, for both establishments and employeesAfter Hurricane Gustav, the Baton Rouge Police Department issued a curfew for 8 p.m., which was lifted to 10 p.m. Friday. There is no indication when the curfew will cease. “Ninfa’s got power on Thursday,” said Jordan Aillet, French senior. “As a server, my shift started at five and we closed at seven.”Aillet said the restaurant was “slammed.””I ended up making $80 in two hours,” Aillet said. “Everyone else did really well, too.”Others weren’t so lucky financially.”California Pizza Kitchen was closed the entire week,” said Ryan Stewart, theatre senior and server at the restaurant. “We are opening Monday afternoon, but it’s been hard not working.”Stewart said he is used to making a few hundred dollars a week but is now “completely broke.”But cutting hours of operation is not making up for losses incurred during the storm.”We’re losing a good hour of business,” said Candice Pecue, assistant manager at Brew-Bacher’s Grill on Nicholson Drive. “Here, every minute counts.”Losing power meant losing all the refrigerated food.”There was a few thousand dollars worth of food lost,” Pecue said. “We had to start from scratch.”Walk-On’s was spared and managed to save all the cold food.”We had a generator Tuesday,” said Kirk Layrisson, assistant general manager. “We were slammed, just like a big game day.”All businesses made an effort to close early enough so customers and employees could make it home before curfew.”The police came by last night to make sure we were closing early,” Layrisson said.Pecue said the curfew has not been too difficult to follow.”When we closed early Friday, people understood they had to be out of here,” Pecue said.Layrisson was pulled over twice in one night for violating curfew.”I just explained to them I manage at Walk-On’s,” Layrisson said.Aillet said the police advised employees to wear name tags that identified them with a restaurant.”[The tag showed that] we had a reason to be out after curfew,” Aillet said. “Then, you wouldn’t get arrested.”American Market at the corner of Nicholson and Lee drives stayed open all week except Monday. It was just as busy as Walk-On’s.”We would try to close early so we could get home before curfew, but we were so busy it couldn’t happen,” said Karen Vong, biology senior and employee at Am Mart.Vong said there were so many customers they were serving them at the door and a line extended around the building.”We ran out of beer on the third day,” Vong said. “All the shelves were pretty much empty.”—-Contact Ashley Norsworthy at [email protected]