Manitobans will be able to return to restaurants, hair salons and gyms in the first step of the province's COVID-19 reopening plan.

That's good news to Keith Gislason, president of the Winkler and District Chamber of Commerce.

"We're pretty excited about it. It's good to see that we hit the vaccination targets and the province is letting everyone open up a little bit. Obviously, we want to open a little bit more as we go forward, but it's a good first step."

The third wave of COVID-19 has been a difficult one to fight through for the city's personal services sector and restaurant industry, but a new rule that gives fully vaccinated people more privileges might help jump-start business. 

Public health officials say fully vaccinated people can eat a meal indoors at a restaurant with other fully vaccinated people they do not live with starting on Saturday.

The Manitoba Restaurant & Foodservices Association says it will be looking for the province to come up with a co-coordinated plan on how the system will work.

The province made the move to stage one of its reopening plan after surpassing its COVID-19 vaccination goals with more than 71 per cent of eligible residents receiving a first dose, and about 27 per cent getting a second shot.

Uptake of vaccines in the Winkler and RM of Stanley area has lagged well behind the rest of the province. Gislason was asked if those low vaccination rates might delay the full reopening of local businesses in the area.

"My hope is that it won't. I think we're seeing that more and more people are getting appointments and getting vaccinated and we'll see if that catches up with the rest of the province or whether it lags behind. In the past, the province has been very even when it comes to opening. They tried the regional thing and it didn't really work because people were traveling to other regions. So, I don't see it having a big impact, but we'll see."