Queenstown's retail industry is bucking a national downturn in the sector.
The Queenstown Lakes District Council's senior policy analyst, Ralph Henderson, presented a retail monitoring report to a strategy committee meeting last week.
It showed the district experienced growth in retail employers last year "despite the global economic climate".
Queenstown Lakes' retail employers increased from 373 to 379 in 2009, a rise of 1.6%.
Nationally, the number of shops declined 0.6% last year.
In 2008, there was a 4.8% increase in retail employers in the Queenstown Lakes district, which compared favourably with a 0.7% growth New Zealand-wide.
Although the number of shops grew in 2009, employee numbers fell from 2160 to 2140 (1%) in the Queenstown Lakes district compared with a fall of 5.3% nationally.
Mr Henderson said the report was used to identify retail and commercial trends in Queenstown and Wanaka.
The district had a usual resident population of 22,959 and 9633 visitors, at the time of the 2006 census, on which the retail sector relied, he said.
The report showed almost 50% of businesses in the retail sector in the Queenstown Lakes district were relatively small, employing no more than five staff.
However, the proportion of these businesses has declined from 52% in 2007 to 48.8% in 2009.
Nationally, small businesses made up only about 37% of the retail sector, which has remained relatively static over the past three years.
Mr Henderson said the council collected some information on the nature of commercial activity in the district and imposed different rates on the basis of activities.
The Queenstown town centre zone has 456 commercial and 137 visitor accommodation businesses, 45 residential homes and 16 lots of vacant land.
Wanaka had 141 commercial and 79 visitor accommodation businesses, 16 residences and seven lots of vacant land.
"Unsurprisingly, commercial uses dominate the Queenstown and Wanaka town centres. Wanaka has a high percentage of visitor accommodation within the town centre zone (32.2% compared with 21% in Queenstown). However, this in part reflects the higher proportion of commercial activities in Queenstown town centre," he said.
Central Queenstown had seen a substantial increase in commercial developments over the past two years, with the majority completed or nearing completion, including the Mountaineer and the Post Office precinct.
