According to many food and beverage (F&B) outlets in China, resumption of business is a slow process.

It seems local governments and Chinese consumers in general are still being cautious even as the COVID-19 outbreak appears to recede within China.

In southwest China's Sichuan Province, entertainment outlets including the F&B service industry have been allowed to gradually reopen since March 17. But a new notice on March 28 has asked KTVs, cinemas, internet cafes and cultural venues (which have dancing and singing activities) to suspend their operations immediately.

It appears bars have yet to be impacted.

La Goccia, an Italian restaurant and bar located in the upscale Taikooli neighborhood in Chengdu, has used the "downtime" it had – two months of closing shop – to explore new strategies.

Cheng Yijia, general manager of Sichuan Lv Shang Rong He Restaurant, who manages La Goccia in Chengdu and has seen through the Wenchuan earthquake and SARS outbreak, said there may have been a surge in consumption, or what is known as "retaliatory consumption" after these two incidents.

"But the scenario this time is different. Consumers, especially the younger generation of 90s and even 00s are now more rational," she told CGTN.

"And so we have adjusted our strategy. We have removed higher-priced items on our menu. Instead, we now focus on lower-priced and value-for-money courses."

La Goccia, which reopened on March 25, lost about 2 million yuan, or 280,000 U.S. dollars, in its two-month hiatus.

"Before the outbreak, we made 100,000 yuan on our best day. Even on a bad day, we still made 20,000 to 30,000 yuan. But now, we make just about a thousand or less. So the difference is still huge," Cheng said.

Cheng, who has been in the F&B industry for 20 years, also said while the restaurant will continue with their online food delivery channel, it isn't banking on it as a lifesaving revenue stream.

"Every single other restaurant is now selling and delivering their food online," she said.

This is exactly what Great Leap Brewing, a Chinese craft beer maker, is seeing: its beers taking off in online food platforms.

Customer engagement manager Joel Senecal said its online sales and beer deliveries are performing far better than dine-in figures.

The bar has seen a revenue growth of 15 to 20 percent since re-opening on March 3.

"The city [Chengdu] wants us to stay at 50 percent capacity with restrictions on our tables. We haven't been filling up that capacity which is slightly worrisome but we understand the city is gonna be slowly coming back to life regardless," Senecal told CGTN.

Senecal said, to a certain extent, people do believe in news that things are back to normal, but he doesn't think it's going to happen immediately.

"I don't think you're going to get a full widespread absolute trust that the situation is back to normal. I think that's healthy and that businesses should allow customers to be somewhat reserved then immediately wanting to back to locations," Senecal said.

"What we can do now is we can take really good care of customers who are coming out, who are venturing to our bar. Hopefully they'll spread the word."

Great Leap Brewing, which started in Beijing and now operates its first location out of the Chinese capital in Chengdu, said it is willing to wait it out.

"Chengdu is a city we wanted to have a location in for a very long time so regardless of sales now, in terms of the future we're really resolved in staying behind our Chengdu location," said Senecal.

 (Video filmed by Li Yang.)