Contrary to the optimistic picture which Cape Town Tourism CEO Mariette du Toit-Helmbold tried to paint for Cape Town’s tourism performance over the festive season, and which we have contested, Cape Town Routes Unlimited has stated that ‘tourism in greater Cape Town had slumped over the Christmas holidays’, after the success of the World Cup last year, according to its CEO Calvyn Gilfellan, as reported in the Sunday Argus.
Gilfellan blamed the unusually strong and extended gale-force south-easter in Cape Town between Christmas and New Year, and the heavy snowfalls in Europe for the tourism “damper”, but said that business had boomed on the Garden Route. The heavy winds kept visitors from most Cape’s beaches and from Table Mountain, Gilfellan said. He quoted arrival statistics, having dropped by more than 3000 international arrivals, on last year’s 77 000 arrivals between December and January, and a decrease by an astounding 16312 domestic arrivals at Cape Town International airport.
The Robben Island ferry operation was not affected by the wind, and its 41000 visitors in December was up on last December’s figures, but the ferry did not operate for a week a year ago. Cape Point saw a decrease in visitor numbers of 9 % and Boulder’s Beach of 14 %. The Table Mountain Cableway had its lowest visitor numbers in ten years in December. FEDHASA Cape Restaurant sector chairman Rey Franco reported “a drop in overall revenue in December”. The impending closure of Jardine at the end of February is blamed on economic factors in the Argus report, in an interview it did with co-owner Wilhelm Kuhn: “Jardine … had not been impervious to the recession, and the World Cup had not brought as big a business boom as expected.”
Cape Town Tourism, by contrast, reported that Cape Town’s tourist season over the festive period had been “better than average”, the “average” undefined, and had experienced an “unexpected increase” in hotel occupancies, contradicting the information supplied by Cape Town Routes Unlimited. In a media release dated 22 December, the Cape Town tourism marketing body stated that the city would not experience a “bumper season”. Mrs Helmbold was quoted ten days later as saying that the festive season was “better than average”, at a time when the festive period had not yet ended, and this appeared to be a thumb-suck not validated by any tourism statistics, given that Mrs Helmbold herself was on holiday over the festive period! She did however concur with Gilfellan in stating in the release that the effect of the World Cup was not yet visible in an upsurge in tourism.
Chris von Ulmenstein, Whale Cottage Portfolio: www.whalecottage.com Twitter: @WhaleCottage