For Ferndale Businesses, Some Win, Some Lose During Power Outage

In Ferndale this week, when it comes to the heat wave and power outage businesses have had to learn to roll with the punches.

Several downtown businesses that had power saw a bump in patronage. 

"Yes, busier than normal," Wendy Gross, a manager at Rosie O' Grady's, said Thursday night as nearly 6,000 DTE homes and businesses in Fernale were without power.

At the beginning this week's blackout, was one of the businesses lucky enough to have power and cold drinks to serve.  

"We did until we lost power around 10:30 p.m." Thursday, Gross said, when nearly the whole city went black around 10:15 p.m.

Reports of power outages started late Wednesday afternoon and peaked Thursday night as some homes and businesses that had power were taken offline for a couple of hours to help restore power to others.

"I am expecting to lose power (again) quite frankly," Gross said. "Nobody's a believer. I heard they were doing two hours on and two hours off."

DTE began rotating outages Thursday to ease the demand for electricity – a process that spelled chaos for businesses that had remained open since the beginning of the power outage.

"At least from what I can tell from the clocks in the house it was (out) about two hours," said Dean Bach, owner of . "Because we were not out of power for long last night."

Dino's Lounge was also one of the businesses that still had power when the blackout first began Wednesday, but lost power around 10:15 Thursday night due to rolling blackouts. Although Bach said the business was not out of power for long, it was just long enough for his lounge to have to shut down in the middle of a busy evening, costing him thousands of dollars.

"It has been a big headache. It's not nice to turn off the lights in the middle of a busy evening," Bach said. "We probably lost a bunch of money, not to mention the stuff I have to go through resetting the credit card machines and configuring what exactly I lost."

As for whether or not the power will go out again, Bach said he is just crossing his fingers it does not. "When you turn out the lights in a house, a carton of milk may go bad and a couple of people may be affected, but when you turn out the lights in an establishment it costs me thousands of dollars."

Nearby did not lose power until 11:30 p.m. Thursday, causing a "massive inconvenience," said George Greco, one of the owners of the popular restaurant at the corner of Woodward and Nine Mile Road.

One local businessman saw a silver lining in the whole thing.

Tyler Hemmingsen had to close shop at when his power went out Wednesday. Thursday, he was on patio taking in the scene and enjoying a cold beverage. “I am just enjoying my first day off in a while," Hemmingsen said. "So thanks DTE."