SITUATION VACANT
JOBS GO BEGGING: Customers turned away amid desperate search for hospitality staff
GEELONG’S restaurants and eateries are struggling to find staff as the industry tries to expand its workforce after the pandemic.
The worker shortage is preventing some venues from opening as much as they’d like, and has seen job ads double in the sector in the past year.
Q Train chief executive Marie-Claire Trotter said she had to scale back bookings because she didn’t have enough staff.
She said a recent job advertisement for frontof-house staff received just four applications in two weeks, whereas pre-COVID the ad would have attracted more than 20 applications in two days. “There are just no staff on the Bellarine at the moment. I think people have retrained during the shutdowns,” Ms Trotter said.
GEELONG’S restaurants and eateries are struggling to find staff as the industry tries to expand its workforce after the coronavirus pandemic.
The worker shortage is preventing some venues from opening as much as they’d like, and has seen job ads double in the sector in the past year
Q Train chief executive Marie-Claire Trotter said she had to scale back bookings because she didn’t have enough staff.
She said a recent job advertisement for front-ofhouse staff received just four applications in two weeks, whereas pre-COVID that ad would have attract more than 20 applications in two days.
“There are just no staff on the Bellarine at the moment. I think people have retrained during the shutdowns,” Ms Trotter said.
“It’s a really delicate balance that hospitality venues are facing at the moment; we’ve had no income, now we have no staff, and when you have these supply and demand issues the only way you get staff is by offering more money.
“I’m genuinely concerned for the hospitality industry. You can see pubs not opened on Mondays and Tuesdays and cellar doors shutting because there’s no front-ofhouse staff.”
Tourism Greater Geelong and the Bellarine executive director Brett Ince said operators had struggled to attract staff for months. Data from Geelong Careers shows 126 hospitality jobs were advertised in the Geelong region in March, up from 47 in March last year.
Hospitality jobs advertised in March included a senior sous-chef at a Lorne hotel, a barista at the Degani cafe in Market Square Shopping Centre and a restaurant manager at Che Vuoi Pizzeria Osteria in Barwon Heads.
Brae restaurant also advertised for a front of house at the Birregurra venue in March.
Ms Trotter said a job ad for a venue manager for The Q Train posted a fortnight ago had attracted five applicants, two of which she deemed serious.
“(The applicants) haven’t met our pre-COVID expectations. I think it will take a long time to fill the role, normally we try and fill it within a month but I don’t think that’s going to be the time frame this time around.”
Mr Ince said a rebound in domestic tourism from Melbourne and a backlog of weddings was fuelling demand in hospitality, and that consumer confidence appeared strong, with people wanting to support hospitality venues.
Elsewhere, Geelong region jobs in education were down to 45 in March 2021 compared with 74 in March last year, according to Geelong Careers data.
Jobs in health have risen sharply from 96 in March last year to 249 in March this year.
Jobs across the G21 region were up to 1335 in March, compared with 747 a year earlier.