February events boost licensing trust sales

After a bleak financial result for January, the Invercargill Licensing Trust’s sales were up by 1.2% in February, thanks to conferencing and events.

In the chief executive officer’s report to the board, the trust stated that its total sales were $10.9 million, 1.2% more than in the same period last year, in the five-week period leading up to March 3.

This was attributed to uptake in the accommodation sector thanks to corporate travellers, the Burt Munro Challenge, Waimumu Field Days, group tours and racing at Teretonga and Ascot Park.

Similarly, its food and liquor sales were also up for the month due to the events.

Chief executive Chris Ramsay said March had been positive for the trust as well, thanks to Super Liquor’s regional conference in Invercargill and the National Leisure Marching Championships held on Friday and Saturday. While there was plenty of activity now, it would drop off after Easter, he said.

The trust’s projected profit before tax for February was $571,000, up by almost 200% from the profit of $191,000 in February 2023.

According to the report, ILT’s combined profit for December, January and February was $1.68 million, 14% up from the same period in the previous year.

Ramsay said the ILT attended all key trade shows and travelled throughout the country regularly to talk to conference and event organisers, and inbound tour operators to push the benefits of coming to Invercargill.

“Because the benefits are many, right? There's so many attractions and so many reasons to come, but we can't do it alone.

“The key for this city, in this province off the back of Covid, is to make sure we're working as closely together to try and drive vibrancy for the city as a whole.”

He admitted that the pipeline of conferences and events for the remainder of the calendar year was “pretty light” in comparison to other years.

“Post-Covid, a lot of events and conferences have chosen main metros to go to as opposed to provincial New Zealand.

“At a national level, there's more competition than ever with the likes of Te Pae Christchurch Convention Centre. We're up against the big players.”

To offset the fact that there won’t be any large scale national conferences or events coming to town, the ILT would create “consistent reasons to incentivise people to want to come out”, Ramsay said.

The trust had noted that Southland had followed the national trend of alcohol sales falling.

Ramsay said this could be attributed to people travelling more to due to relaxation in Covid restrictions. Previously, it had benefited from border closures and people not buying alcohol from duty-free stores, he said, adding that the other effects of this trend would remain to be seen.