Batter Up! Cupcakes in Rancho Bernardo had plans to close its doors early today thanks to the massive power outage that suddenly struck San Diego County and surrounding areas Thursday afternoon.
Batter Up! Cupcakes (Courtesy photo)
Owner Paul Stiritz, who also is director of corporate partnerships for Storm Baseball in Lake Elsinore, said he received a text between 3:30 and 3:45 p.m. from his wife and shop co-owner Danielle, alerting him that the small business — as well as every other business, store and home, seemingly — had lost power.
“San Diego and surrounding areas are experiencing a black out eta for power could take Hours,” Danielle’s text read.
Stiritz heard through his wife that the power could be out until 8 p.m. tonight, he said.
A tweet from San Diego Gas & Electric read: “We understand power is out, we are working on the cause and solution. We do not have a restoration time yet.”
Yet another tweet states that SDG&E determined the power outage originated in Arizona: “Again, the outage seems to have originated in Arizona. This caused our line from AZ and from the north of our region to both trip off.”
Batter Up! Cupcakes, 16769 Bernardo Center Drive, typically produces 300 to 1,500 gourmet chocolate-and-peanut-butter, “Strawberry Shortstop” and pina-colada cupcakes, among other flavors, per day, depending on demand.
Stiritz said that thanks to the power outage, their point of sale system was down, and coolers had to operate on a few hours of backup power.
“If it’s out for an extended period of time, we’ll probably lose all of our cold ingredients,” he said. “It’s going to have a negative impact, of course.”
Even though a local pub, URGE Gastropub, next door is keeping its doors open and taking cash-only orders, Stiritz said it wasn’t likely they could keep their doors open or even stand on the corner selling the last of its cupcakes for cash.
“Too hot outside,” he said, smiling.
Stiritz said Batter Up! plans on opening their doors at their normal time at 11 a.m. Friday.
Email Rachael.recker@swrnn.com or follow her on Twiter
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