Buffalo, N.Y. (WBEN) - As hospitals and other essential workers in Buffalo continue to put in the hard work during the Buffalo Blizzard this weekend, some local restaurants on Christmas Eve came to the aid of the first responders by supplying them with food.
One of those places, was Gino's NY Pizza on Main Street in Amherst in the University Plaza. Arsim Rexhepi, one of the four brothers who operate the business said it was a nonstop effort since he opened the store on Christmas Eve, he had to call upon assistance just to open the door.
"When I came here, everything was blocked," Rexhepi recalls, "I couldn't even open the door. I used my feet to open the door because there was so much snow. There was a big plow truck working in our lot and I asked him to help me out and he did and then as soon as we opened, it was packed. People in and out."
Upon open, he got a call from a worker at ECMC and sooner than later, all the local hospitals called to inquire about ordering, "They called us and we did it. We gave food to ECMC, Buffalo General, VA Medical Center, Children's all of them... a lot of pizza and a lot of wings, too," Rexhepi said.
Rexhepi said that they donated or deeply discounted most of the food to the first responders and gave away at least 25 pies and a couple hundred wings.
For Rexhepi and his brothers who took no breaks from open to close, it was important for them to give back as they know what it's like to go without food.
"That meant a lot for us because we came from a country from war. Like I know how it feels because we wouldn't have food for a month. So I know especially when you have kids, have no food at home and everything else is closed... I was like we got to do this. We got to do this. We did a lot of pizzas," Rexhepi says.
His family migrated from the Republic of Kosovo in 1999 and has been in the food industry since 2006. While it was only him and his brothers at the shop on Saturday, the pizzeria employees came in and faced the wrath of the blizzard to be there, "One employee, he walked in the snow to get here, he's been with us for 20 years. He fell like three or four times. Rain, snow, he never gives up. He's always here," says Rexhepi.
Some restaurants also came to the aid of the local hospitals, The Little Bakery delivered to Oishei's Hospital and Erie County Police as well as Imperial Pizza on Abbott.
