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Excerpts from: Study concludes that smoking ban didn't hurt restaurant sales

Source Associated Press [7/05/03]

SIOUX FALLS, S.D. - South Dakota's year-old clean-indoor-air law protects people from secondhand smoke without cutting into businesses' sales, according to an analysis by an anti-smoking group.

Some business owners, however, say anecdotal evidence points in the opposite direction, with sales declining immediately after the law went into effect.

The South Dakota Tobacco-Free Kids Network said that, according to South Dakota Department of Revenue reports, gross sales revenue at businesses designated as eating places has not declined since the law became official on July 1, 2002.

In every month from July through May, overall gross sales were ahead of the same month the year before. They ranged from about $1 million ahead to more than $5 million.

"The results do not surprise us, as we have seen data from other states and communities that have passed similar laws, and this is the norm," said Dr. Allen Nord, chairman of the Tobacco-Free Kids Network.

"The tobacco industry and its supporters use scare tactics to convince business people that their business will suffer if such a law is passed. Objective data from across the country shows that clean-indoor-air laws do not harm business. This data just reinforces what we already know."

The 2002 Legislature voted to prohibit smoking in any public place that is not a motel room or does not have a liquor license or a minimum-age requirement to get in.

Several restaurant owners take exception with such studies, noting that many of them are based on gross sales figures, which taken alone do not necessarily account for rising costs and inflation.

So even if gross sales are up slightly, that doesn't mean profits are, said Jerry Zurovski, owner of Jer-Mel's in Sioux Falls.

Either way, Zurovski said, sales have been affected. He said that in the four months after South Dakota's law went into effect, he noticed a sharp decline in sales.

"It definitely impacted the restaurants," Zurovski said. "There's no doubt about it."

Zurovski's and other businesses that had not previously sold alcohol, including Perkins restaurants in Sioux Falls, bought alcohol licenses to do so because that allowed them to again cater to smokers.

Information from: Argus Leader