Edmonton café struggles as Alberta teachers strike disrupts local business

As the Alberta teachers’ strike enters its second week, businesses near schools are feeling the economic impact, with some reporting a significant drop in foot traffic.

Strom Coffee, a popular spot located directly across from Edmonton’s Strathcona High School, has been hit particularly hard.

Since opening in 2023, the café has thrived on the bustling after-school crowd, but due to the strike, the café has been forced to reduce its business hours.

“Ever since the strike happened, we would have had to make the decision to close down earlier on some days, because we can’t afford to stay open since we’re so reliant on that community,” said Gabriel Byström, co-owner of Strom Coffee. “Typically, we always get a rush in the morning, lunch and then after school. But now it’s a slow process throughout the whole day. We’re very thankful for everyone who comes in.”

The Canadian Federation of Independent Business says younger businesses and those next to schools are the most impacted during the labour dispute. They stated the same thing happened last year in Saskatchewan during their teacher strike.

“They have less of an emergency fund to be able to weather events like this,” said Kayode Southwood, Canadian Federation of Independent Business. “We saw that roughly a third of small businesses in the province reported a negative impact on their operations, and that translated into about 3/4 of those impacted businesses experiencing staffing and labour challenges. And from those challenges, we saw those businesses in Saskatchewan reported a decline in revenue for about a quarter of those impacted businesses.”

For Storm Coffee, they are hoping for a deal to end the strike, so they don’t have to modify their hours long-term.

“That’s the decision we have to make in the future,” said Byström. “I believe we’re surviving now, which is great.”