FOCUS on BUSINESS with NATALIE O’CONNOR

Tourism The State of Play Right Now One Shop Keeper’s Story

Tourism holds an important role in the economic development of Australia. According to Tourism Australia, domestic and international travel spend in Australia totalled AUS$122 billion in 2018-19. Tourism was growing year on year faster than the national gross domestic product (GDP). It also totalled 5% of the workforce.

However, Australia has experienced a horrendous start to 2020. There were fires which engulfed much of the country, then floods and now COVID-19—a global pandemic, closing boarders, causing sickness and death.

In Australia there have been strict measures put in place to help stop the spread of the virus. This has helped “flatten the curve” of infected people, but it has meant that most of our boarders have remained closed and thus our tourism industry has taken a huge hit. To get a greater understanding of what this means, we talk with Richard Preen, Shop Manager of The Three Sisters Souvenirs and Gift Shop, to understand what businesses in the tourism industry are going through.

Welcome Richard, thank you very much for agreeing to be interviewed for our magazine. Could you tell us a about your background and how you came to become the Shop Manager at the Three Sisters Souvenir & Gift shop in Katoomba?

Thank you.

Originally, I’m from the UK. I left there and went to Hong Kong in ‘91. I started doing bars and restaurants, ended up managing a few. Then I had the opportunity to come to Australia in 2004, whereby again, I went back into bars and restaurants. In that time, when I was working for a bar and restaurant in Echo Point Plaza, they had a bottle shop, a lolly shop, souvenir shop, a cafe and a restaurant, and I ended up managing the whole lot. Then in 2015, another company came in and took the lease over the whole building, so we had to vacate the premises, but they wanted to keep the souvenir shop going. So we found a location for the souvenir shop, which is this one now. Then a year later the owner asked me if I wanted to buy it, so I jumped at the chance and bought it.

What made you want to own the souvenir shop or get into business? By the sound of it, it sounded like it was just a great opportunity.

Well, it was, and it wasn’t. The person I bought the business off. Obviously, I worked with him before. I used to manage at the centre for him, but he told me it was making money and it actually wasn’t. But I bit the bullet and changed the signage. As soon as I changed the signage, the business went up between 20 and 40%, which is amazing. It’s something simple of what I did, even though I couldn’t really afford it, but I’m really, really glad I did it. And also, it’s better working for yourself because you don’t have to answer to anybody.

What do you find most rewarding about your business?

Meeting people from different walks of life and different countries. Generally, just talking to people and just finding out where they’ve been and what they’ve done.

You’d get a lot of people up there. Well, before, yes. Not now.

How has COVID-19 impacted your business?

Massively. Massive, massive, massively! My brother, he’s got a chocolate shop up here and he’s not as impacted as me. Everyone wants and is still going to eat chocolate. He’s not dependent on overseas trade, he’s an everybody trade. Everybody loves chocolate.

I’m a souvenir shop. I’m reliant on overseas trade, overseas people. It’s very rare that anyone locally would buy souvenirs. Even if you do come up from Sydney, Melbourne or Queensland (pre borders closing) people just aren’t traveling.

So what I’m doing now is to look at my stock and make sure I stock more things that are: (1) made in Australia, (2) things about the Three Sisters. Like stubby holders, everyone will buy stubby holders. I’ve also got mugs, stubby holders and magnets with pictures of the three sisters, with more items to come soon.

Has the market in Katoomba just quieted down? Or completely closed?

I closed my business on the 23rd of March. They said, “Look, if your business is nonessential, we’re closing.” I’m a souvenir shop, I’m not essential. And in hindsight, I’m glad they did because they let all the people off on the cruise boats and they all had COVID-19. If I’d have been open, I’d have got COVID-19.

Here in Katoomba there is a doubledecker bus company, which I sell their tickets. They’ve been operation for 45 years. I think if it wasn’t for the JobKeeper payment, they would have gone under.

They’re not a small business. The manager of the business looks after the staff big time. Even when there’s nothing to do, he’s like, “Oh, can you come in and paint the shop. I’ll pay your normal rate,” and this, that and the other. He’s trying to keep his staff on. Normally, they’re open from 9am until 5pm, but they closed at 12 o’clock now because there aren’t people coming up anymore.

How do you see the tourist industry now? Do you find that a lot of businesses are adapting to this change or they’re just shutting?

I think they’re shutting. I think it’s a case of it’s too hard to change for many of them. Also, possibly it’s like, well, maybe I’ve had enough. Maybe I won’t change. But what am I going to do? I may as well adapt and try and do something different.

For me, the next thing I need to do is go down the path to get as much things orientated around the Three Sisters and Katoomba. Someone from Sydney will come up, “Oh, do you have this?” This bag from you is from Katoomba, I can tell it because it’s of this place. I’m also looking at more and more things that are Australian made.

So I guess that’s what’s making your business more unique, isn’t it? That you are sourcing Australian made products.

Yeah.

I’d rather find a supplier that can give me Australian made things. They cost me more, but at the end of the day, people want something that’s Australian made. They don’t mind paying the price. As long as I’m not overly priced.

You’ve got to get a happy medium. You get people coming in and not wanting to buy things from China, but then don’t want to spend the extra money to buy things that are Australian made. It’s a balance.

So the future of the tourist industry, I guess, is just so dependent, would you say, on COVID? Or do you think that you see a lot more interstate travelers coming?

I’m not sure, but I don’t think we’re going to see interstate travelers, no. Do you have to go out now? Do you have to go out on holiday? You don’t.

A lot of people should just be at home and spending a lot more time with their family because they’re actually not spending the time with their family. But that’s my opinion.

What can we the readers do to help your business and tourism in Katoomba?

Well, you could come to the mountains, you can help the little guy. I mean, I’m obviously the souvenir shop, there are other souvenir places in town. We’ve got one at Echo Point, which is run by the council. I’m assuming that because it’s run by the council, the council won’t be paying any rent, or marginal rent. Their overheads would be minute.

You’ve also got Scenic World. Now Scenic World, they’re also buying stuff which is from overseas. And they have no overheads, they own that business. But again, what I would say is help the little guy out. The big, they’ll be looked after. They’re earning millions of dollars a day, whereas I’ll be lucky if I make a million dollars in 10 years and enough to keep my head above water. I mean, at the moment, the JobKeeper is keeping me afloat. If I didn’t get the stimulus package back in March, I would have gone under. Guaranteed! I would have closed. I wouldn’t have had the money to survive. But the JobKeeper is keeping me afloat, my landlord has come to the table, and he’s given me a reduction in rent. But again, without all these bits and pieces helping out, I wouldn’t have survived. But at least I stuck it out. I had money saved. I haven’t been out and blasted it on something. I’ve kept it just in case of a rainy day, and fortunately enough, I did.

We were affected by the bushfires, Christmas and the school holidays in January, we didn’t see many tourists. It’s unfortunate because Christmas and the summer school holidays, that makes you money for the rest of the year. That is the busiest time of year. Because it was a complete ride off and that’s why a lot of places closed up here because we couldn’t foresee getting past it. And then after that, we had the floods. The train tracks were washed away by the floods, so people couldn’t come up there. It took people about three or four hours to come up here. And then we have COVID-19.

Can people buy online from you?

Well, actually, they can. I’ve got a Facebook page. It’s under ‘Three Sisters Souvenirs & Gifts’. If they send me a message,

my wife, (I’m useless with technology) can send things out as long as it’s within Australia at the moment, as we are having some trouble getting things out overseas at the moment. It seems to be taking ages.

Where are you located? And what’s the best way for people to find you, then?

Located at the top end of Katoomba Street, near the roundabout, just across from the station. Or you can find me on Facebook.

Is there anything else you’d like to add?

Yeah, I want to add that I sell the bus ticket for the Blue Mountains bus company, just because it is busy, a lot of people just queue up for the Blue Mountains Explorer bus. They can come to me and buy it, and they don’t have to queue up. And you can help local businesses up here.

Thank you so much for your time.

Thank you.

To get in contact with Richard, please visit: Facebook: Three Sisters Souvenirs & Gifts

Address: 7 Katoomba Street Katoomba, New South Wales 2780

Phone: 0450 565 724

Richard would like to offer all our readers a 10% discount on purchases until the end of October 2020. Just mention this article to receive it.

Also mentioned in this article is the Blue Mountains Explorer bus (https://www.explorerbus.com.au/) Tickets can be purchased directly from Richard.