NORTHWEST TERRITORIES
In many communities in the NWT over the past couple of weeks, one thing was very noticeable - there were fewer people around.
Sammy Inthavong, co-owner of Woodland Wok and Grill in Hay River, says the restaurant was not impacted by spring break. - Paul Bickford/NNSL photo |
It was spring break time for schools, and many young people (and a fair number of their parents) made their annual exodus to the warmer climes of locations in the south.
It might be logical to suspect that a wide variety of NWT businesses would suffer through those two weeks with fewer customers and therefore take a hit to the bottom line.
However, based on an admittedly non-scientific sampling, most NWT businesses seem to have weathered spring break quite easily, if they noticed at all.
Matthew Clark, manager of the Inuvik NorthMart, said the number of customers at his store remained steady over spring break.
Clark credits that to events that continued to take place during spring break, both in Inuvik and in surrounding communities.
"Along with spring break comes all the local festivals and everything else, as well as hockey playoffs," he said. "So there is both an exodus from the community, as well as people coming into the community."
Over spring break, Clark did not see some of his regular customers in the grocery store and there were fewer young people.
Still, he said the number of customers continued to be pretty reasonable, attributing that partly to people coming into Inuvik from smaller communities before the ice roads closed for the season.
"They want to come and stock up on things and buy certain things," he said. "They're going to lose that opportunity in the next number of weeks."
Of the five businesspeople contacted in different communities, only Dana Fergusson, co-owner of Pelican Rapids Inn in Fort Smith, noticed any significant decline in the number of customers.
"I've definitely noticed a decrease with travel," she said. "We have a lot of government travellers that come to Fort Smith because we're primarily a government economy here. So with everyone on spring break, there aren't the meetings or the conferences or what have you. Everyone is taking a vacation and so definitely we see it during spring break in a decrease."
In fact, she estimated the numbers of travellers at her hotel was down about 20 per cent over spring break.
It's like that every spring break, she said.
"It's quiet and slow for us during spring break, but, as soon as everyone comes back, we forget what it was like to be so slow and then it picks right up."
Fergusson, the vice-president of the Thebacha Chamber of Commerce, expects that a lower number of people travelling to Fort Smith would also affect other businesses in the community.
"It we don't have the people here, they're not in the community spending money," she said.
However, Fergusson doesn't think much can be done to halt or slow down the annual exodus of people from the NWT during spring break.
"I don't think you can change their minds after winter," she said. "They want to go and see some sun."
At the Woodland Wok & Grill in Hay River, co-owners Ping Inthavong and Sammy Inthavong did not notice any decrease in business over spring break.
"During the spring break in March, we were very busy," said Ping Inthavong, noting the customer numbers never dropped at the restaurant.
While some people may have left Hay River for destinations in the south, the restaurant co-owners noted many other people from smaller communities headed to the town for some shopping before the ice roads close, and some ended up at Woodland Wok & Grill.
"They come from everywhere," said Sammy Inthavong.
Dave Wilkes, general manager of Big River Service Centre on Highway 3 at Fort Providence, also didn't notice any change in the number of customers.
In fact, it was the opposite.
"March has been good. We've noticed a definite increase in traffic," Wilkes said, attributing the increase to events in Fort Providence, Yellowknife, Behchoko and Hay River.
"People are on the move and I'm happy about it," he said. "We're in a perfect position to catch anybody coming or going, so that's quite different than anybody established in a town and watching all the people leave the town."
With Big River Service Centre's prime location on Highway 3, the business also benefitted from travellers from further north driving south for spring break.
"Unless they're flying out, we've got them," Wilkes said.
In Fort Liard, Cathy Kotchea, manager of Acho-Dene Native Crafts, noticed no impact from spring break on the store.
"There's no difference," Kotchea said of spring break. "It doesn't affect the store whatsoever."
