Getting ready for cruise ships
Businesses hope passengers will bring increased sales this season
The first cruise ship for the 2024 season is set to arrive in Charlottetown on April 8 and P.E.I. businesses are gearing up.
Inside a knitwear and tartan shop on Victoria Row in downtown Charlottetown, the staff have been getting ready.
The store contains different art and crafts as well as gift items like bags, clothing and jewelry, among others.
Wanda Watters, the owner of Northern Watters Knitwear and Tartan Shop, said her other store located in Nova Scotia saw a surge in sales when a cruise ship docked there.
She is now hoping the same thing will happen when the ship arrives in Charlottetown on April 8.
“We expect it to be better than last year. We keep getting increased sales and the company keeps growing, year to year.”
Watters said the store features items from more than 300 Canadian artisans, with some products imported from Scotland and the United Kingdom for tourists.
“With the increase of cruise ships, this year brings more tourism, which then supports all the artisans and helps the economy,” she said.
During the cruise ship season, she said she gets the opportunity to meet people from all over the world. She loves the atmosphere it creates and how everyone gets excited to see new faces around.
Watters said her business had great sales during the previous cruise ship season and became so busy that they had to have staff at the counter attending to customers for hours because of the constant influx of customers.
That wasn’t the same for one downtown Charlottetown restaurant.
Pierre Hajjar, the owner of Gaias Urban Eatery, said that his restaurant did not receive as many customers as he had hoped for during the previous year's season.
He is hoping to make up for the losses incurred last year by attracting more customers this year. Hajjar added that the cruise ship season is a significant boost for businesses like his as it helps to cover up for any losses they might have experienced during the winter season, which is usually slow for restaurants.
With the ship arriving on April 8, the day of the solar eclipse in P.E.I., he said he doesn’t expect sales to be high, as most people will prefer to stay indoors or gather to watch the eclipse.
“I think Monday would be a bit relaxed for us and after that, we hope we have more sales, more people who will come because we can we need that,” he said.
“Everything is getting expensive and not everyone can afford that. So, people from abroad and people who are coming with the cruise ship, I think they're willing to pay the restaurant those prices and experience the restaurant.”