Local businesses take a hit
• Kendall’s Hotel co-owner David Marshall.
By Taylor Clyne and Daisy Baker
January 19, 2022
As positive Covid cases increase across the state, and the approach has shifted from snap lockdowns and border closures to ‘living with Covid’, local businesses have taken a hit.
January is a busy month for eateries and accommodation across the North-East, with holiday-makers in town but sadly this year, many outlets have had to close their doors for days at a time due to staff shortages or Covid exposure.
Kendall’s Hotel in Scottsdale has closed their bar and gaming area for several days this week, leaving the restaurant offering limited dine-in and takeaway services, while they experience staff shortages due to a positive case among staff.
Co-owner Mr Probert said the biggest issue they’ve faced recently is cancellations in their accommodation, which is usually full of workers at this time of year.
“It is full at the moment but last week we were all booked out then had eight cancellations because of being close contacts,” he said.
“We probably lost $1,200 a night for five nights so about $5,000 for the week because they cancelled and that’s pretty much been every week for the last month.”
He said their patronage has also noticeably dropped.
“Locals are too scared to go out because no one wants to get it. Meals have probably dropped from 40-50 a night to 10 a night average,” he said.
“The bar is down, and gaming is down by a long, long way.
“The price of everything has gone up – we’ve had eight price rises on alcohol over the past two years. Everything is going up except our profits.
“It’s the same for every small business but it makes it hard.”
Bridport Café had to close their doors for three days in the New Year after staff were exposed to a positive case.
“It would have been the biggest weekend of the year for us, it was just terrible. It was very emotionally, mentally draining,” owner Linda Arnison said.
“Everyone went and got tested, we made sure that all our staff were negative, the place was deep cleaned then we opened back up.
“The community was really supportive and understanding.”
She said going forward, continuing to wear masks, and requesting all customers mask up and sanitise is their best defence against Covid.
In the greater North-East, the Gladstone Hotel has also suffered staff shortages and were forced to close their doors over the weekend.
Owner Cathy Willis said the past fortnight has been difficult.
“We’ve been trying to keep our business open as much as we can, but we had to shut our doors over the weekend.
“I was in hospital, not for Covid but something else, and had lots of staff off, some of whom had Covid and some isolating as close contacts.”
It’s their first summer in the business after taking over in July.
With the eight casual staff on the team in and out of isolation, it has been hard to keep things rolling but Ms Willis hopes things are looking up.
“I’m hoping it’s on the downfall now. We’re hoping to open bigger and better as of next week, introducing more stuff,” she said.
“We’d like to thank all our patrons for bearing with us and supporting us.”
Dorset Mayor Greg Howard said businesses across the municipality were all facing similar challenges and the issue is two-fold.
“In discussion with some North-East business owners, it appears they are faced with two major issues: the first being staff and close contacts being forced to isolate and therefore unavailable to work, and secondly the lack of patronage – especially by locals who are extremely cautious about venturing out, especially in situations where they are indoors and required to wear masks,” he said.
“There is no short-term solution to these problems as even now there is only roughly 4% of the population of Tasmania affected and with exponential growth expected the worst is clearly yet to come.
“It is certainly worrying that the businesses are once again copping the brunt of the pandemic and it’s Council’s hope that they can survive and over the next few weeks infections begin to drop,” he concluded.