Alan Brown - A man of mana

Arriving in Queenstown as a young bank manager at 26, Alan Brown became one of the town’s most renowned moteliers, heading the industry nationally and sitting on the New Zealand Tourism Board in the late 1970s, early 80s.

It was no mean feat getting to Auckland and Wellington for meetings, often prime ministerial ones, for this Mount Cook frequent flyer, with compulsory stopovers at Mount Cook, Christchurch and Rotorua. The Mount Cook Airlines manager eventually gave him a ‘letter of introduction’ asking pilots on full flights to let him sit in the cockpit jump seat. “I arrived late once while my flight was taxiing along the runway, so Geoff Ramshaw said, ‘Hang on’ and rang the pilot,” Alan grins. “The plane stopped, and they drove me out so I could hop in.”

He’s been stuck in lifts with former PM Rob Muldoon. “The lift broke down and he cackled that laugh and said, ‘The bloody media can’t get me now’.”

Born in Dunedin, Alan’s dad was a Railways station master at Omakau, Morven and Winton where Alan started work as a teller at Southland Savings Bank. He played rep tennis, winning a Southland doubles title before SSB sent him to Queenstown to manage its new branch. That was 1964 and Alan deemed Queenstown ‘over-commercialised but still going forward’. Only the third bank in town, he was warned by a competitor not to ‘get any funny ideas’ about stealing clientele.

He didn’t have to. They came, initially to bank space in a small shared premises with Des Gavin’s booking agency. “We had the most deposits of any of SSB’s four new branches within four months of opening.”

Alan and wife Marie sold their Winton home for £2000 pounds buying their Survey Street home for £6800 pounds.

He established a good rapport as manager of the major home-lending local bank.

Alan became an advocate for women’s rights too. Employing married women was forbidden by the bank “in case they got pregnant”. “I wrote to my general manager and told him there was such a thing as the pill and it appeared to be working,” Alan says. He was given permission to employ the bank’s first married woman, who ended up as manager of Riverton branch.

Numerous Volkswagen cars with skis strapped to the back poured into town during winter, Mount Cook storing its weekend ski proceeds in a 24-hour cash deposit box at the bank. Alan used his two free ski season passes, but preferred golf, squash and fishing.

The Browns loved Queenstown so bought a house in Man Street with vacant land, where the Softel is now, and built and opened Ambassador Motels in 1973.

“The opening tariff was £12 a night for two. It was quite bewildering then to borrow more than you’d earn in your lifetime.” Alan was quickly asked to chair the local Motel Association’s 12 members.

Marie managed the motels while Alan managed the bank for two years, nipping home at lunchtime to service units. Two guests refused to let him service their room because he was “a bank manager dressed in a suit”.

New guests at another motel once asked to leave food in their yet to be serviced unit fridge and went sightseeing. Other staff, thinking it was left behind, divvied it up as the owner was away. “The incoming guests asked where their food was on return causing great alarm. Taxis were dispatched to staff homes to return the bounty.”

“We had one business phone and a phone for our flat then – 575 and 998S,” Alan says. Messages were delivered at all hours running up and down stairs.

He became national president of the Motel Association of NZ in the late 1970s, a Tourism Board member soon after. “We welcomed the half millionth visitor to NZ in March 1984. It was a big deal.”

Alan and Marie had Ambassador Motels for 27 years, selling in 2000. “I’ve been on sabbatical ever since,” he grins.

‘Sabbatical’ involves countless hours whitebaiting on the West Coast and playing golf, Alan on a 28 Handicap at 85. He’s a Life Member of Queenstown Golf Club, Queenstown Squash Club, and Hospitality NZ.

A Queenstown Fire Brigade volunteer for 45 years, notable fires include the White Star Hotel and Sunshine Bay blaze set off by a couple who lost their engagement ring and lit a fire to find it.

Alan’s been a member of Queenstown Rotary, and Jaycees president when fundraising often involved selling manure from Henry Barker’s woolshed and annual walking track clean-ups.

Founding chairman of the Wakatipu Working Men’s Club after a public meeting left standing room only, they started a locker system in the Memorial Hall then Trans Hotel, later building what is now the QLDC offices in Gorge Road.

Still acknowledging women’s rights, Alan’s adamant he couldn’t have done any of it without Marie.