Orchard Park, N.Y. (WBEN) - As soon as the doors on her family-owned O'Neill's Stadium Inn opened on Feb. 20, manager Kristen Snyder saw some familiar faces that had been MIA earlier in the week.
The faces?
Construction workers from the new Highmark Stadium site just down Abbott Road from O'Neill's.
During the four-day Highmark Stadium construction pause - that ran from Feb. 16 to 20 - much of the 1,500-person construction workforce was not on site as investigators probed a wave of vandalism that took place in recent weeks.
For O'Neill's, it meant a 20% drop in normal, weekday business.
"We were counting the days until they (the workers) came back," Snyder said.
And, they did when work resumed on Feb. 20.
"I was very happy to see them back in the building today," Snyder said.
It is estimated that the Highmark Stadium construction workers lost a collective and combined $1 million-plus in wages because of the pause.
"People had to watch their wallets," said Tyler Radwin, who works for Quackenbush Co., one of the stadium's subcontractors.
Mark Ebeling, owner of Danny's South restaurant, said the financial impact at his Abbott Road eatery.
"We did see less out-of-town guys come in," Ebeling said. "They would come in, but in spurts."
In the latest round of vandalism at the $2.2 billion new home of the Buffalo Bills, graphic and pornographic graffiti was spray painted inside four luxury suites along with other minor damage elsewhere in the stadium.
The vandalism reports remain under investigation by the Erie County Sheriff's Department.
Total damage has been pegged at $150,000.
Meanwhile, the lead contractors- Gilbane/Turner - have offered a $100,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of the person, or persons, responsible for the vandalism.
Even with pause, the stadium is on pace to be completed this summer.