Fewer N.Z. visitors to Queenstown

Press, 29 June 1985, Page 13

Fewer N.Z. visitors to Queenstown

From

SUE FEA

in Queenstown False impressions of a lack of beds in .Queenstown during the 1985 summer season have been .blamed for the loss of about 5000 New Zealand holidaymakers expected in the area this year. The Queenstown Promotion Bureau has attri2 per cent, drop in domestic, holidaymakers to the area bn incorrect reports that Queenstown had no accommodation over the summer holiday season. About . .216,000 New Zealanders visited the resort in 1984 but statistics to June show that'only 211,000 are expected for 1985. However, Queenstown exabout 31,000 international visitors this year — more, than a 13 per cent

increase over the number of international visitors to the area in 1984. The growth in overseas visitor numbers was rising dramatically but “adverse comments” about a lack of accommodation in Queenstown had made the resort suffer a 2 per cent loss in New Zealand holidaymakers, said the bureau’s former executive director, Mr David Bradford. The first signs of the effect were evident in January this year when motel occupancy was down between 10 and 15 per cent, Mr Bradford said. “We have heard that tourists have been told elsewhere in the country to bypass Queenstown as there were no beds,” he said.

Beds were short at toplevel hotels but not in

motels which were traditional New Zealand holidaymaker accommodation. Mr Bradford said he thought the problem was only temporary as efforts were under way to try to re-educate New Zealanders and the travel industry that there was accommodation readily available most of the year in Queenstown and that it was just the hotels that were usually booked up. The New Zealand holidaymaker was equally important to Queenstown as the overseas visitor. The bureau intended to ensure that Queenstown did not lose New Zealanders over the “big spending” overseas tourists.

“We still live in the hope that the North island will discover what it is missing,” Mr Bradford said.