Virginia Beach, Va. - The ice frozen too hard for a shovel to work.
"Yeah, everything is working against me," said Thomas Reap of Reap Industries Floor Coverings, located off of Virginia Beach Blvd.
So this small business owner tried a hammer instead.
"Snow is cool, but the ice, I can live without. Trying to keep Reap Industries alive and the weather is trying to bring me down," said Reap.
Reap had to put some muscle into it when the heavy equipment couldn't work, all to break through the ice in front of his business so none of his customers or employees would slip and fall.
"It's nothing like I've ever really seen before. It's usually just snow and a little bit of ice on top. But this is just solid ice all the way through," said Reap.
Business owners, like Reap, have had to deal with a solid sheet of ice outside of their establishment, on top of the cold, making it difficult to work in.
At Autobell Car Wash off of Independence Blvd., cars were in and out, getting all cleaned up after days of driving through the snow and ice.
And the workers, they were going back and forth from inside, too, then right back out in the cold.
"As long as we're running around, we keep ourselves warm, by running around," said Hunter Kane, manager of the car wash.
Kane says he gets his team prepared for the cold days in advance. But no matter what, they can't avoid the work and the cold.
"I always tell the guys to layer up. I'd rather them strip layers off as the day goes on and they get heated up than being too cold. I don't want anyone out here miserable," said Kane.
So while work still has to be done, many of the folks NewsChannel 3 talked to say they are ready for some warmer weather to move in soon.
