Scenic to keep 8-10 staff on at closed hotels

SCENIC Hotel Group says it will keep up to 10 staff employed to look after its four glacier hotels, which are about to be mothballed for at least a year.

Normally, at this time of year, as many as 180 staff would be employed at the Scenic Hotel Franz Josef Glacier, Heartland Hotel Fox Glacier, Te Waonui o Tane Forest Retreat at Franz Josef and the Glacier Country Hotel at Fox.

Scenic general manager Brendan Taylor said yesterday staff numbers had already been reduced to 45 across the sites.

"We are scaling down to probably eight to 10 staff to look after the assets until they can reopen. We’re having discussions with most of our team now as to what we can do for each of them on an individual basis."

Hopes for a continued wage subsidy or other government assistance to help businesses survive the sudden loss of international tourists were dashed by Tourism Minister Stuart Nash when he visited Franz Josef last week, empty-handed.

Mr Taylor said news that the New Zealand borders were unlikely to open, not even to Australia, until January "if lucky" had prompted the decision to move the hotels into hibernation.

There was simply not enough tourist flow on the West Coast.

"We’ve got four hotels at Franz and Fox so we will be looking after them and we will be coming back, but the business is so limited and so skinny we would rather give it to the rest of the community to try and keep them afloat and keep them going, so when we do open up 12 to 18 months down the track at least those two communities are still there and are still alive," Mr Taylor said.

Westland Mayor Bruce Smith described that as a "wonderful gesture" that would help save the smaller accommodation providers in the glacier towns.

"There is a significant oversupply of accommodation and tourism products in the region. Scenic have made a decision that will hopefully be for the betterment of the community," Mr Smith said.

"This will allow smaller operators who do not have the strength of a national group to benefit from the tourism dollars that remain."

Scenic was still committed to the glacier towns, and had expressed a commitment to continue to promote the region where it could through redirecting online searches directly to alternative local operators.

"This is a lifeline that will help the remaining accommodation providers,"

Mr Smith said.

"I want to express my personal thanks to the Scenic Hotel Group for taking what is a strategic move to reduce bed numbers, thereby assisting every other accommodation provider in the Fox and Franz area. Scenic Hotel Group is a large and successful hotel group that has invested on the Coast since the 1980s.

"Council has been saying since March of 2020 that there were 80% too many beds and 80% too many cafes in the Franz-Fox area. This move will bring considerable benefits to those remaining," Mr Smith said.

Glacier Country Tourism Group co-chairman Rob Jewell said yesterday the closures were "devastating but understandable".

"It’s just not sustainable for business currently running at 20% of normal volumes. We are all in the same boat ... we’re all hurting," he said yesterday morning on the Breakfast television show.

Mr Jewell stressed the Glacier Country was still open for business.

Despite the closures, Fox Glacier still had more than 1000 beds available, and Franz Josef had 1400. 

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