How summer’s shaping up for QT hospo
The Christmas dust has settled, the New Year has begun and summer is well and truly underway. Many Queenstown hospitality businesses are reporting pre-covid levels of customers and Queenstown airport supports this sentiment with international passenger arrivals surpassing 2019 numbers. This summer is set to be the busiest one in several years, and it appears staffing shortages are slowly turning around – so what’s expected for the rest of the season?
Russell Gray is the Director and CEO of Good Group, owners of many establishments around town including Bardeaux, Botswana Butchery and White + Wongs, in addition to businesses in Auckland and Australia. After a disappointing trade in Summer ’22, it seems things are making a comeback for the business in ’23.
“Queenstown is buzzing and demand is high – it’s as busy as pre-Covid levels. There’s a lot more domestic travellers than pre-Covid. The rest of the summer looks promising as more and more overseas visitors arrive.
“The real challenge for all is in relation to staffing – we simply don’t have enough to operate 7-days as was the norm pre-Covid. New staff being hired from outside of Queenstown are finding it almost impossible to get rental accommodation – put simply, there is the perfect storm of a labour market crisis and rental housing crisis,” says Russell.
Local makers of Ginger Bear, Crimson Badger, have been operating for five years now – the brand distributes its products throughout New Zealand and is looking forward to continued growth in 2023. Ginger, Founder and Operations Manager Wesley McAllister worked within the Queenstown hospitality sector for several years before starting the company and has a sound understanding of pre- and post-Covid levels in town.
“We have seen a notable increase for sales in general, but I don’t believe we’ve seen the full potential due to the lack of staff and venues not operating to their full capacity. We are very excited to push distribution to the North Island this year – this is a market we’ve not had the staff or ability to support yet.
“From the beginning we’ve been a ground-up business and we’re excited that despite the past challenges to pull the trigger and invest in equipment that will enable increased production and efficiencies within the business in 2023. I’m hoping this will allow the team to focus on quality, product development, and sales,” says Wesley.
Blair Impey is the CEO at Republic Hospitality, who are responsible for ten bars and restaurants around town including Sundeck, Habana Rum Bar and Below Zero Ice Bar. They’re reporting a cracker of a Christmas and New Year period and are seeing a good amount of people coming to town and looking for front-of-house jobs. Blair has also noted that many tourism buses have been struggling with drivers and have cut services as a result. This is causing a slow in regular mid-week business, despite tourist demand for the bus services.
“This last week, numbers have been strong and you can see the number of people coming through town is increasing. It’s still obvious that a lot of restaurants do not have enough shifts and because of that a lot of people are walking around trying to find some food and are struggling to do so, which then means that post-dinner drinks at bars generally would appear slower.
“We’ve just opened Birdy, a new bar above Habana, which we managed to open just before Christmas. Then, we have our new restaurant called Soda opening in April or May, which is the old Prime restaurant on the lakefront. We’re spending a lot of focus on getting that going at the moment,” says Blair.
In all, it seems that while town is getting busier, staff and rental property shortages are still having a knock-on effect. The hospitality industry is coping as best they can, but remember to book ahead where possible, be patient, and be kind.
